The Darkness Beneath
by MrVermilion
Summary: The Dragonborn has killed just about everything on or under Skyrim. Once he gets out of the dungeon, he doesn't give the dead a second thought. But what if one enemy didn't quite die? What if one monster followed the Dovahkiin back to civilization, hellbent on settling the score? This is that monster's story.
1. Chapter 1

**Prologue**

Snow creaks beneath me as I move. My approach is unhurried, but the beast makes no attempt to escape. His breathing is ragged, and dark blood has stained the snow beneath his jaws. Little puffs of white rise at every huffing gasp he expels. I halt beside the massive, glittering eye.

"Now," I say, and my breath fogs as if I too can breathe fire. "Tell me of the Horned Man."

The beast's huffing grows more intense. It takes me a moment to realize he is laughing at me. I clench my sword so hard that the blade trembles, scattering droplets of blood. "Tell me, beast."

"Fool," he says. His voice is like tamed thunder. "He will kill you."

"Maybe," I say. "But not in time for you."

He laughs again. "I have lived a great many years, fahliil. Perhaps it is time I tried something new."

I hiss. The woman knew nothing. The old men knew nothing. Now this great lizard will slip away into death without a word, smugly secure in his dotage. Every path a dead end.

"Besides," he continues, "what could I say? He has the soul of a dovah. He is a wild thing. Who can predict where he will alight? He will go where the wind calls him. He will fight and love, conquer and fail and rise again. That is what it is to be dovahkiin."

"That is what it is to be _alive._ " My voice cracks like a whip, echoing across the stillness of the peak.

There is a twitch in the great maw, and I have the impression that the beast is smiling. "Perhaps. So live. You are young enough. And you will not catch him."

"I'll catch him." My flare of anger has left me as suddenly as it arrived, and I look away into the night. Snow settles in my hair. It is a delicate sensation. I have not noticed it before. But I have little experience with snow.

"I wonder," the beast murmurs, as if to himself. "Why did you come here? You could not have thought to find him. Not once you had interrogated my students. And you must know by now that any information I could give you would be much behind the times."

I am silent.

"Ahhh," he breathes. "Perhaps you thought you would draw him out? You think he will weep for his dear teacher, vow revenge? That he will rush to find you even as you hasten to meet him?" He laughs. "You will be disappointed, child. There is too much of the dov in him. No one remains to shed a tear for old Paarthurnax. You saw to that."

The great scaly head shifts. I subtly alter my stance, but the beast only slumps into a new position and sighs through something thick in his throat. His breathing seems raspier than it was as he resumes speaking. "No. You will not catch him. Not unless he wishes it. And if he has not turned to meet you by now, then he is playing some other game and you are only a toy in his hand. When he tires of you, he will throw you away. If you are lucky, your gods will catch you in the afterlife."

"I have no gods," I tell him. "Except myself."

He begins to laugh again, but then his great eye narrows on me. "Yesss. I see. Such a little scrap of divinity. Tovok. Remarkable. Where were they hiding you, all these years? But it is inconsequential, in the end. If he does not kill you, you will kill yourself. That power is too much for you."

I place a foot upon his flank, pressing into the wound. A sinuous ripple runs through his body as he flinches. "You spoke to him," I say. "Where was he going?"

"He had business with thieves. He joked of it. That is all I know."

My heart quickens. There are thieves all across this squalid land. It need not mean Riften. But it is a direction, and a hope. I will take it. I turn away, starting back through the snow.

"Will you not grant me mercy?" the beast calls after me.

I look back. Snow is already accumulating on the dark huddle of his body. Soon he will be obscured. For all that, the snow is not urgent. No wind drives it. It trickles gently from heaven, each flake settling in funereal stillness. It's like watching the deaths of stars.

"Krosis," the beast murmurs. Sorrow.

I turn and walk away into the night.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 1**

 **Storm in the mountains. Borgakh the Steel Heart. An escape.**

I should have killed the dragon. Instead, I only listened as he died. He shouted with his last breath, and the sky answered. The gentle snowfall became a blizzard. Wind arose from nothing. I have little experience with storms, but even I can tell that there is something unnatural in this one. I can barely see through the torrent of white driving into my vision. Every gust threatens to rip me loose from the mountain and into open sky.

The cold is all that makes it bearable. It awakens me. I have not yet replaced my wrappings or my helm, and so I can feel the thrill of winter on my skin. Its cut is keen and sweet, the touch of a rival so old that it has become more friend than adversary. Without the cold I would have turned back for the monastery long ago.

Perhaps turning back would have been wiser. I can see very little, but that is no problem for me. The problems are the wind, the snow. Texture changes underfoot, and with every step the wind claws me subtly off-course. I have lost my sense of where I am, and now I find nothing familiar in the world around me. I hope the stairs are still close by, hidden in the blizzard, but I have no idea.

A boulder taller than I am looms out of the maelstrom. It is what I have been looking for, something large and unyielding enough to serve as shelter. I must wait out the dragon's curse here, though the delay burns in my gut like fire. I have been close twice since I came to this land, but each time he has slipped away at my approach. This will make the third near miss. I begin to think that the beast was right, that he is toying with me.

He will learn better.

The other side of the boulder juts up against a stand of trees that claw from a drift like skeletal fingers. It's not much of a shelter, but at this point I don't care. I sink into a crouch in the snow, propping my sword beside me and huddling back into the drift. The wind pulls an endless line of white around me, stinging at my cheeks. I wonder how long this will last. If there are hints written in the storm, I cannot read them.

For lack of anything else to do, I watch the wind chase the snow into the night. I see a thousand patterns, formed and instantly gone. If the workings of a madman's mind were visible, they might look very much like this: frantic motion without direction or point. All the same, there is something transfixing in it. When there is movement in the deeps, it is calculated and purposeful, hoarded for the right moment. This kind of motion is alien to me. I am like a miser watching some mad profligate throw coins into the streets. The sight is appalling and entrancing at once.

I wonder why the dragon has done this. I wonder what he was trying to accomplish. Had he always intended to strike some final blow? Or is it his bitterness that I didn't finish him when he asked? That seems most likely. Still, perhaps it has nothing to do with me. Perhaps at the last he felt that if he must die, he would leave a final mark on the world before he left it. Bereft of friends and followers, perishing alone on a frigid peak, perhaps he made the sky itself his mourner and slipped from life to the music of its savage elegies. There is something admirable in that thought.

I should have killed the dragon. I…

Smoke. I smell woodsmoke on the wind.

I turn, lifting my head over the drift. In the distance, I can see a tiny point of light amidst the crushing dark. Some unfortunate was climbing the mountain even as the old beast's funeral commenced. And now that traveler has started a fire.

I replace the wrappings on my face, pull on my helm. Then I rise from my crouch, snatching up my sword, and begin to stump through the heavy drifts. It feels unnatural to approach so openly, but it would be pointless to try my usual methods in the midst of all this. So I blunder forward like a child too young to be cautious, shielding my eyes with my free arm. As I draw nearer, I begin to see indistinct shapes in the chaos. One traveler, broad and dark, is silhouetted against a flame built in the shelter of one of the stone shrines I saw on the way up. I have inadvertently found the path again.

The figure leaps up as I approach, drawing a sword. The motion is quick and smooth, but the stance looks stiff, uncertain. Well-trained, but inexperienced. I let the sword drop from my shoulder to trail in the snow as I cross the last few paces. The face makes my gut twist. It's one of the orc creatures that I have occasionally seen in this land, its piggish features set and wary. I think this one is a female, but honestly I can't be certain.

It takes me a moment to coax warmth into my voice. "Hail traveler. May I share your fire?"

The orc blinks foolishly a few times before answering. "Who are you?"

"I don't think you would recognize my name." I pass by the sword's point to crouch by the fire.

"All the same, I will have it." She – I am almost sure it is a she – is trying so very hard. It would be almost endearing were she one of the brethren.

I prop my sword beside me and wonder, wrapping and rewrapping my fingers on the hilt. Well, what does it really matter? It's not as though she could recognize me. I release my grip on the hilt and mime warming my hands. "I'm called Roke. You?"

"Borgakh," she says. "Though some have named me Borgakh the Steel Heart."

Borgakh the Steel Heart. Soon I shall laugh at her, long and hard. For now I restrain the impulse. "You choose an unlucky time to take up mountaineering, Borgakh the Steel Heart."

She flinches. "How so?"

I gesture mutely to the wind and snow.

"Oh," she says, lowering her weapon slightly. "Of course." She seems to ponder for a moment, doubtless trying to coax her sluggish porcine mind back into motion. "We orcs think little of weather. I mean, had I not feared losing my way in the storm…" She cuts off.

"You would already be at High Hrothgar," I finish.

She frowns. "So you heard it too?"

"If you mean the dragon."

"No," she says. "One of the masters atop this mountain. I was in Ivarstead, but somehow his voice came to us, with a noise like thunder. He begged for help. He said something terrible was happening."

Ah. I'd wondered what that had been about. One of the old men had stood facing the wind as I'd approached, mouthing soundlessly. At the time, I'd thought him paralyzed by terror, or perhaps simply senile. So he'd tried to claim his revenge. And now his efforts were rendered futile by his own master. Poor old fool. I'd flung him from the heights. It had seemed a good end for a coward. For all I knew, his broken corpse was under our feet right now, swallowed by the snow.

"You truly didn't hear it?" she says suspiciously.

I am growing weary of this ugly creature. Still, I should learn more.

"Only Ivarstead heard what he said."

"Oh," she says. "Then what are you doing here?"

I have a moment of inspiration. "I've come from High Hrothgar," I say. "I was studying with the masters. They sent me to find help. A dragon attacked."

"What of the Dragonborn?" she says.

"Gone," I say, allowing some of my real bitterness to slip into my voice. "Three days gone." I glance at her, judging. "He is the one the masters sent me to find. They hoped he might already be on his way. Is he still in Ivarstead?"

"No." She sounds taken aback. All the pomposity has drained from her. "No, he never returned after he went up the mountain."

I curse under my breath. He _is_ toying with me. Why else would he risk leaving the mountain by a different path? What does this mean, if it's all a plan to play me? Should I be suspicious that he mentioned thieves? Perhaps that too is part of his game. But it doesn't change anything. I have no other leads, and he can't be aware of everything. Even if I'm walking into a trap, a noose tied for one neck can fit another just as easily.

The orc crouches next to me, disturbing my thoughts. "Do you… did he say where he was going?" She sounds unsure.

I shrug. "He said something about thieves."

I am watching carefully for her reaction, but she barely seems to pay attention. "He must have heard of something urgent," she murmurs. "Something that couldn't wait." Her face is troubled. "Did he leave any message? Anything to be delivered to Ivarstead?"

My interest flares. "Perhaps," I say. "I was only a student. I wasn't told everything."

"They must have been waiting to send it down the mountain when the man brought the food," she says. Her voice has regained some of its surety.

There was no message. I know when someone lies to me, and I asked after just such a thing when I put the old men to the question. Still, she may be more useful if I am agreeable. "That was their custom. But what message is this? I don't understand."

She puffs up a little. "I am the Dragonborn's sworn sword. I help him in his quests."

I smile, safe beneath my helm. So, Horned Man, is this too part of your plot? I don't think it is.

"I see," I say. "So you are the companion he spoke of?"

She preens. Now that I am more accustomed to her features, I realize that she is quite young, probably still in her teens. "He spoke of m…. yes. I am the one." She hesitates. "He said good things, I hope?"

So that is the way of it. Foolish girl. "He said his companion was a woman of great valor."

Her smile is furtive and quickly masked by bluster. "Good. I'd have to knock him upside the head otherwise." She laughs, a hollow, forced sound. I do not reply, and her peals wilt and die in the moan of the wind. She looks awkwardly for me when it is over. "If… if he's gone, then perhaps you and I should return to the monastery. I will do what I can in his stead."

"No," I say. "The masters said only the Dragonborn could face the beast."

"Then they..."

"If the Dragonborn is not on his way, then it is already too late for the masters. But he must know of the threat."

She nods slowly, looking up into the driving snow. "It… must be very mighty. Would that I could give it a taste of my sword." Her voice is nearly as hollow as her laugh, but oddly earnest. I think she believes her own lies, at least a little. "But you say only the Dragonborn could hope to win?"

"I trust the masters."

She accedes without more argument. "Then we must get off this mountain."

"No one else came with you?"

She laughs. "Others came," she says. "But they turned back when the storm grew bad. We orcs are hardier than that." She gives me a speculative look. "What race are you? You have a strange accent."

"Altmer."

"I had not heard that Altmer followed the Way of the Voice," she says, frowning. So, Altmer was a poor choice of lie. She does not seem to care for them.

"One of the many ways I disagree with my kindred." I say it with emphasis, and she seems a little mollified.

For a time we sit together in silence. The orc girl fidgets constantly. I wonder whether I should broach the subject of alliance myself, but she will be less suspicious if the suggestion comes from her.

At last, she speaks, but not to offer fellowship. "I think the storm is getting worse," she says, looking around. Her blunt features are troubled.

I follow her gaze, but I do not agree. The storm is getting no better, certainly, but it does not seem to be worsening either. On the other hand, I have begun to realize that some of the girl's fidgeting may be not so much impatience as awkward attempts to cover her shivering. Once I've begun paying attention to her, it's difficult to miss. So much for the hardiness of orcs.

"You may be right," I say. "But what are we to do?"

"Our path is clear," she says. "We must leave the mountain while we still can."

"And go where?" I say. "The masters charged me to find the Dragonborn. I gave my word." I want to make this much clear quickly. She must not think of taking on my message herself.

"He left me with certain letters he had intended to deliver," she says, puffing up a little again. The effect is spoilt by a deep shudder that wracks her from heels to teeth. "Perhaps we might start there."

We. An excellent word. "But if he was called away suddenly..."

"I believe it lies on the way to Riften," she says. "Or near enough. We were to deliver the letters to a woman named Sylgja, in a town called Shor's Stone. I believe he knows her. We could at least see."

No more mention of the supposed "message" in High Hrothgar. The fear of the dragon must be keeping her in her place. That's good.

"Then I'm with you," I say. "But this mountain will be treacherous while the storm goes on. We should wait until it clears."

"Nonsense!" she says, rising. "Going back is simple. It's going up that's the trouble."

"Maybe when you stopped," I say. "Matters have changed."

I can see in her eyes that she isn't listening to me. Her jaw is set and stubborn. "The further down we go, the easier the weather will become," she says, and keeps moving. What is this? Bravado? Or is she really so foolish as that?

"The path will be treacherous," I say. "It is safer to wait."

"Stay if you will," she says. "I will not wait." All of her bombast is back. I realize that she thinks we're competing for position, striving to be leader of our impromptu partnership. If she stays, she reveals how cold she is. Reveals her weakness. And now that she's made her decision, she can't back down without taking a submissive role. Her only option is to leave, and make me look the coward for staying. I feel a surge of anger at the stupid sow. Still, I make a last effort.

"If we dig in, we won't be as cold."

She waves this away, looking smug. "I will wait for you at the inn below," she says. "But only for one night. Then I must go." She starts away into the snow.

I fight the urge to snarl. Fool. But now what? The Horned Man has left letters with her. I know where they are going, but possessing the letters themselves would be better. I could kill her now, take them. Would that be best? But then, what are the letters next to the insight of someone who has actually traveled with him? I doubt she was his companion for long, but even a little information is more than I have.

I cannot let her escape, but now that she is in hand, I don't want to kill her either. As I dither, she begins to vanish into the falling snow. She looks back once, perhaps to see if I am following. I let her see me sitting quietly beside the dying fire. When she turns away again, it is with a resolute twitch of her shoulders.

Just before she vanishes completely, I rise and follow. I do not feel stealthy as I trail her. My armor is heavy and I am clumsy in the wind. All the same, she does not seem to detect my presence. Perhaps that is unsurprising. These people do not hear well, and in this storm even I might have trouble hearing if the wind did not favor me. I stay on the very edge of visibility, ready to fade into the storm if she looks back. She never does.

Despite her confident words back at the fire, she moves cautiously. Perhaps she really is all bravado, or perhaps she is beginning to realize what she has begun. She chooses her steps with care and hunches before particularly violent gusts. I must grudgingly admit that if she insists on doing this, she is not doing it poorly.

The girl is focused on keeping her feet, and I am focused on keeping her in sight. Neither of us sees the troll until it is upon us. I spot it first, my eye drawn to an eerie stillness in the maelstrom, a fragment of winter that seems frozen in midmotion. Only then do I detect the dead, glittering eyes in the vast gaunt shape. It is horribly still for a moment. Then it lurches into motion.

The girl doesn't see it until it is almost upon her. She voices a thin cry that is quickly swallowed by the night. The troll, her opposite and her contrast, is silent on the attack. Its claws uncoil with eerie, liquid speed, like blades on the tails of a whip.

The girl is quick, raising her shield just in time to keep it from tearing her throat out. Even so, she staggers beneath the impact. She falls to one knee. The troll's second blow catches her under the breastplate, lifting her entirely from her feet. She arcs back, trailing snow. When she lands, the drift gives way beneath her, spilling her out along a steep slope and toward a precipice. She loses her shield, turning over a dozen times in her mad tumble before she begins to slow. By then she is rolling out onto a lip of rock. She flails frantically at the stone.

I am in motion, leaping forward. The troll senses my coming, but not swiftly enough. I feel the shudder through my entire body as my sword cleaves its spine. Blood paints the snow in a broad arc. I skid forward into the drift as the troll falls behind me. I am forced to drive my bloody sword into the snow to arrest my momentum.

The girl has slid to the edge. She grasps at a single wizened tree growing out in her path, but she is too slow. She misses it by inches and topples on toward the wind and the void, still scrabbling uselessly to hold on. Her eyes are very wide as she looks up at me.

I should let her fall. Saving her would be too much risk, for too little gain. But it comes to me that if I let the girl die, I am once more playing the Horned Man's game with no leverage of my own. In that moment, my mind shows me an image of him in the whorling snow behind the girl. He is a vast shape hundreds of feet high, a force as terrible and primal as the storm itself.

I leap forward through the cold.

The girl spills over the edge, trailing clumps of snow and her own despairing shriek. My blade thuds home into the tree and I explode over the brink in a torrent of white. I grasp her pauldron, but it tears free. For a moment I think I have failed after all, but then my fingers snag in the lacing of her vambrace. I bring her up short with a wrench that I feel up my arm and all the way down my spine.

She dangles below me, snow spilling onto her upturned face. Her eyes are wide and disbelieving. Her feet kick pointlessly at the open air. Above us, the tree groans before a gust that howls out along the edge of the abyss, swaying us like a ghoulish pennant. In the ragged voice of the wind I seem to hear all the screaming of the world.

I grit my teeth until they creak. I take a long breath. Another. On the third, I wrench my arm upward, pulling the girl to me. There is a dull clang as our breastplates ring together. "Hold to me!" I gasp. "Hold to me!" She clamps her arms and legs around me. I can feel her shaking.

"Climb up," I tell her. "Climb."

She stretches out a hand, fumbling for a grip. We twitch and jerk upon our tether for a few long, agonized moments before she is able to clamber over and off me.

When her weight vanishes, I gasp and I haul myself back along the sword. As I reach the tree, I find that we have nearly split it in twain. I give my blade a wrench to free it, and the tree sags. It was a close thing. Far too close.

The girl huddles against the broken trunk, tightening both arms about it. Her dignity seems slow in returning. "How?" Her voice is hoarse.

"What do you mean?" My arm is throbbing. I wish I could remove this armor and tend to it, but I dare not. Not while there is a witness.

"I saw you." Her eyes are wild around the edges. "You were all the way up there when I fell. Malacath himself couldn't move that fast."

"Time plays tricks in the moments before death," I say. She hasn't looked for my footprints in the snow. That's good. Perhaps she won't think of it. Weariness is settling over me like a mantle. My breathing is ragged. I drive my sword into the ice and lean on the quillons.

The girl shakes her head, but doesn't question me further. She lurches to her hands and knees and begins crawling rapidly away from the edge, as if it is easier if she does it quickly. I follow her more slowly, trying not to show my weakness.

As I crest the rise, I find her standing in the darkness of the troll's blood, looking down on its body. "Who are you?" she say. "You're not just some student."

I draw to a halt. "No?"

She laughs, and it has a tinge of hysteria to it. "You lifted an orc warrior in full plate. With one arm. And this troll. You…" Her expression clears. Her heavy brows relax. For a moment, she looks almost pretty. "Wait. It's you, isn't it? It's you under there." She takes a step toward me.

"Who?"

"You know damn well _who_." She is breathless with relief. "I thought… it doesn't matter. How are you doing that voice? It sounds like you're a… "

I laugh. I laugh long and hard. Though a gust tears away most of the sound, what remains is enough to quell the girl. She stares at me, silent, and something behind her eyes pulls closed like a flower at nightfall. When I finally cease, wheezing and leaning on my sword, her face is troubled. Speech can lie, to someone like her. Laughter never can. It need not tell the whole truth. But it doesn't lie.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I was wrong. You're not him."

"No. I'm not." I rise up and lean my sword against my shoulder. She stares at me as I pass by. Her eyes are wary and uncertain.

I focus on the cold. It kisses my skin like a lover, and as I walk I begin to feel… not strengthened, but honed. My strength has not yet returned, but my weakness has been pared away like dead wood. Only my will remains. That is as it should be.

I come to the top of the slope before I pause to look back. The girl is still standing over the body of the troll, a tiny huddled point of dark amidst the fury of white. I wait. I do not speak. Instead I watch her and wait, and by these signs I show her my will. At last she takes a single, tentative step.

And I smile.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 2**

 **Recovery. Ivarstead. The eastern road. Borgakh tells a story.**

By dawn, the storm is as dead as its maker. The wind falters and the temperature rises, squeezing sweaty moisture from the walls of the dugout. A faint blue glow begins to bleed through the snow. Though I am still weary, I rise. Even after all this time, I cannot seem to sleep in daylight.

The girl is huddled beneath her cloak. Her eyes twitch spasmodically beneath her lids. I think of waking her but decide against it. For a little time at least, I will need to be a version of myself that she can understand and follow. It will be wearying, and I am not eager to begin until I must.

My sword is driven into the center of the dugout to break the roof in case of collapse. I leave it behind me and crawl out the hole into the dawn. The early sun on the snow is like a sea of molten fire, and it wakes a familiar ache behind my eyes. The vista from this vantage is impressive, and I stare out at the land below me for some time. It seems unfathomable from this height that I have been hunting the Horned Man for over a year now. I look upon this delicate little country beneath and it seems I should be able to circumnavigate it in an hour.

I set to removing my armor, dropping the plates in the snow with dull clinks. The gambeson beneath reeks of blood and fouler things, and I am relieved to shed it. The caress of winter air on my bare skin is exquisite.

My arm is swollen and mottled with bruising, but I have had worse. The heat from the dragon's flame has left me with a livid burn along my left side, but that too is easily borne. I am still hale, then, though the usual aches persist. I pack snow in my hands and scrub at my chest and arms, cleaning away sweat and blood and grime. My muscles gradually relax and I begin at length to luxuriate in the kiss of snow. Then a drop of crimson falls past my hand.

I fumble at the wrappings over my face, and find that they are crusted with dried blood below my nose. My hand comes away smeared with fresher red, breaking its newfound purity. I pack the snow against my face and breath out hard, discharging as much of the bleeding as I can until it stops. Then I let the reddened snow fall and pack it down with my boot until I can no longer see the color.

I am clothed and armored again by the time the girl emerges. The morning light etches deep shadows in the rough topography of her features, making her look more brutish than ever. She winces at the touch of the wind and hesitantly extends my sword toward me. I take it from her.

The girl grunts and twitches her shoulders, looking awkwardly at me. "What's that made of?" she says at last. "Your sword, I mean?"

"It is an heirloom. I cannot say."

"I didn't expect it to be so light," she says. "I thought it was a greatsword, but it's so… whippy." She affects a self-consciously bluff tone. "I like a weapon with more heft, me. But it's still good smithing."

Only a fool wields a weapon heavier than it needs to be. "Thank you." I lean it back against my shoulder, looking out over the expanse. After a moment the girl steps up almost beside me, but lingers just a shade behind as if reluctant to impose. That's good. Sleep and rest do much to blunt fear, but something has remained.

"The Dragonborn is ahead of us," I say as I look out. "I know little of this country. Is there a way to make up the time?"

The girl inflates a little, clearly pleased to be consulted. "We are going to Shor's Stone, yes?"

A good question. The Riften connection is tenuous at best, and according to the girl her master had intended to go to Shor's Stone. But he left the letters behind. Perhaps that means he now has a different destination in mind? Or is it only that he does not care about the letters? Maybe this Sylgja is his lover, and carrying mail was only his justification for returning.

"Have you looked at the letters?" I ask.

She seems taken aback. "Of course not. That would… that would not be fitting."

I consider trying to argue with her, but her mulish expression makes it clear that would be useless. Next I think of throwing aside all the vague possibilities the girl represents and simply taking the letters by force. I find deceit distasteful. I find uncertainty galling. Before the coming of the Horned Man, my life encompassed neither. Now I live in a world of vagary and possibility, and some part of me desperately wants to return to that which is clean and solid and sure by cutting through everything else. Literally, if necessary. I could do it. But that is not yet my will.

"We'll go to Shor's Stone. Is there a quick way?"

"We can cut across country," she says. "It will be more dangerous, but faster. But if he was in haste, he might have done the same." She follows my gaze out over the land. "He can move very swiftly at need. He may be far ahead."

"Not so far," I say. "Not so far yet." I'm not sure if I say it for the girl's benefit or my own. Then I turn away and leave her by the brink. I think she is a little startled by the abrupt conclusion to the conversation. But she does not test me by breaking the silence as we walk. She is not entirely foolish. She may even be wise, in time.

Though the storm is gone, the snow remains, and it takes us much of the morning to reach Ivarstead. The town did not escape the storm, and we follow a trodden-down path of many footprints through the drifts. Though the path shows that the residents have been abroad, no one else is outside as we approach the inn.

The door creaks open beneath my hand, disgorging sweaty heat and a babble of voices. The talk dies away as I lead the girl inside. My eyes are still dazzled from the sun on the snow, and as the many heads turn toward me I see the people as a shadowy mass of twitchy, arachnid movement in the dark. Eyes flash at me out of the gloom, catching the light from the open door.

"It's you," says someone. I blink, trying to focus on him. "Did you find the Dragonborn?"

"No," says the girl. She closes the door, cutting off the light. "He left by another way. He was gone."

"Gone?" I am beginning to see the speaker, a bearded human man with an axe at his belt. He looks troubled. "Gone where?"

"I cannot say," I reply. "But I saw him leave three days ago."

"And who are you?" he asks.

"Roke. A student at High Hrothgar. The masters sent me to find the Dragonborn. They thought he might still be in Ivarstead." Now that I can see more clearly, I become aware that nearly the entire town is crammed inside this timber hovel. Children's eyes glitter from the darkness under the tables. Their parents sit above, propping their elbows amidst a mess of mugs and crude weaponry. It seems I have interrupted a council of war.

"What happened?" says a woman. "Are the Greybeards well?"

"A dragon came upon the peak," I say. "A very terrible beast, and old. The masters bade me flee, and warn what help might come. They hoped that the Dragonborn would hear, and come to them. They said he is the only one who might defeat the beast."

"A dragon?" The bearded man is sweating nearly as freely as I am. Dark patches stain the underarms of his shirt. "Ridiculous. The Worldeater is dead. The Dragonborn has slain the Elders. What dragon could threaten the Greybeards?"

Fear makes him bold. But such boldness is brittle, and easily guided. I step toward him. I am the taller, and he shies back at my coming.

"Do you doubt my word?" I ask him.

"I do not know you," he says. "Who can say if your word is good?"

"I am Roke," I lie, "and my word is good. But you need not trust to that. Trust to what your own eyes have seen. Do you think that storm last night was natural?"

He falters, and lets his gaze drop.

"Not even the masters had such power," I say, turning to the rest of the room. "But the beast has a mighty thu'um. Perhaps the mightiest left in this world. Save one, of course."

"You're telling us the Greybeards are dead?" says a woman by the wall. She has crossed her arms as if to hold herself in place. Still she trembles.

"I did not see them fall," I say. "But the storm began upon High Hrothgar. I saw it as I fled. It was fiercest there."

Some of them turn to look, as if they can see the mountain through the walls. There is a long silence before they begin to speak again.

"I still say we should go up and…"

"Without the Dragonborn, that's a fool's errand."

"The dragon might be gone."

"And it might not. You know they like their mountains…"

I move past them. The girl stands awkwardly to one side, and some of them ask her opinion. I think she gives it, but I do not particularly care what she says. I approach the aproned man behind the bar. He has not spoken yet, nor has he made any motion. I had thought perhaps he was made of harder steel than the others, but as I grow near I see it is not so. His eyes are haunted and his hands are balled and white-knuckled.

"You… you need something?" he asks as I approach.

"I am going after the Dragonborn. But before I go, I must have supplies." My pack was lost and abandoned in the fight with the dragon last night, and it held only what I had hastily stolen from the old men's larders. My last meal that I can recall was some goat meat red from the bone. I was in haste before I arrived at the monastery, and did not tarry to gather supplies. Now the aftermath of two battles has taken its toll, and I am sick with hunger. Fortunately, I did not put the old men's gold in the pack.

I produce it now, laying fat coins upon the bar. The innkeeper's watery eyes gleam greasily in the lamplight, and he clears his throat before he speaks. "Hunph. What, ah… what supplies do you prefer?"

"Food. Drink."

"Yes, but what kinds?"

"Whatever won't spoil." Behind me, I can hear the colloquy slowly collapsing in on itself. People are beginning to leave in ones and twos. I turn to watch them go as the innkeeper begins to stack food on the bar. A child takes a capering leap into the snow and slashes at the air with a wooden sword, insensible of any danger from dragons or storms. He swats next at his mother's skirts, but in response she only catches him up in her arms. The door closes behind them, and I am left with the conjoined silhouette of mother and child as my only point of shadow in a bloody afterimage.

Borgakh is conversing with a man by the door, a guard perhaps. He wears mail and his sword is well-kept. They are animated, and I hope that I have not unexpectedly gained a new companion.

"Who is that man by the door?" I ask the innkeeper, but he does not reply. I turn and find him staring down at his hands. He has paused in packing up my food.

"It's funny, you know," he says, though his voice is soft enough that I wonder if he intends me to hear. "We've always been the town beside the mountain. Beside the steps. We'd have people come on pilgrimages. Not often. Once in a while. But… once in a while was enough. It gave us something to be. What will we be now?"

I do not know. I do not care. I say nothing.

"It's funny," he says again. "It's like… like you get used to the world being a certain way. Little things change. This king dies, or that one. Enemies fall or they rise up. But the things that matter, they don't change. Same people. Same town. Same conversations over and over. It never changes. It's comforting, really. But then it does. It does change. And it's only then that you remember that it can." His hands are trembling. "It's like waking from a dream."

I tap the bar with a metal clad finger. He flinches.

"My supplies?" I say. "I'll buy a satchel too, to hold them."

"Of course," he says, obsequious again. "Yes, I'm sorry. Listen to me, rambling on…" He bursts into bustling motion, keeping his eyes on his work and away from me.

It's not like waking. It's like falling into a dream you can't escape. Everything feels less real, less solid, and always you remember the world as it _should_ be. And yearn and yearn to wake. He will see it in the end. He will yearn. He will never wake.

Borgakh approaches as the innkeeper cinches up the pack. "I've consulted with a man I trust," she says, "and I've confirmed our route." Her pomposity is back in force. I hope it fades when we no longer have an audience.

"Good." I dig in the pack and emerge with a wedge of cheese. Then I sling the straps over my shoulders. "It's time we were going."

She is taken aback. "Now? I thought perhaps a bath, a hot meal…"

"The Dragonborn is three days and more ahead of us."

She has no reply to that, but still she dithers for a moment before turning to the innkeeper. "Master Wilhelm. I'll need the bag I left with you."

He seems to notice her for the first time. "Ah. Of course." He bends to rummage behind the bar and emerges with a bulging travel sack. "You'll be leaving, then?"

"It seems so," she says, peevishness in her voice.

I start toward the door, and after a moment I hear the girl curse under her breath and follow, bidding a hasty farewell to the innkeeper.

"Good luck!" he calls from behind. "I hope you find him. I hope…"

I never hear what else he hopes. We are gone by then, out through the door and down through the town. Some of the men eye us as we pass. The bearded man is among them, and I wonder if he intends to climb the mountain despite all. Not that it makes much difference now. He will find nothing but corpses and ruin, a little broken piece of the world that used to mean something. And I will be far beyond his reach.

No one has yet beaten a path out of town, and we are forced to wade through the drifts. I remove my helm to eat the cheese. The gauntlets are not dexterous, and I am indelicate, bending my head into my palm to bite and tear. I can almost feel the girl's eyes on me, but she does not comment until I have replaced my helm.

"Has something happened to your face?" She is trying to be casual.

"No."

"But those bandages…"

"I have a condition," I say. "I was born with it."

"Are you… you're not a vampire, are you?"

That had not occurred to me. "No. I am… malformed. It makes me recognizable. People talk, and my family would pay well to hear of my whereabouts." I like the lie. There is a kernel of truth in it that makes it feel stronger. I feel I have chosen well.

I expect the girl to ask further questions, but she surprises me. "I see," she says. "Then I shall ask no more." Her voice is gentler than usual. I have chosen well indeed.

We travel to the East for some time, skirting the edge of a ragged ridge. A wild tangle of broken peaks stretches off beneath us, fiercely white in the blaze of the sun. The mountains fade into a dull haze on the horizon, where even the blue of the sky is consumed by the grey eternity that overhangs the sea. We come to a stream that froths out over the edge and into empty space. I leap it at a bound, but the girl tarries to step carefully over the rocks. She does not look at me as she crosses, and I do not speak.

We pass a lonely tree and an ancient tower manned by a single aged orc who surveys us from a craggy embrasure. The girl raises a hand to him. It takes him a very long breath to return the gesture, and he does not smile.

Next we cross a bridge and a stretch of long road. The snow grows shallower as we progress, until we walk on hard-packed earth and rock. We climb a slope into the highlands, driving heavy boots into marshy soil and tufts of scant and yellowed grass. We walk then some time in the heights, traversing a narrow band of stone and barren earth overlooking a slope on either side. At length, we pass a crude campsite, where dirty men and women huddle beneath lopsided tents. A threadbare banner of blue homespun flops disconsolately back and forth in a mocking wind.

The girl halts. "Stormcloaks," she murmurs, gazing out at the camp.

"Weren't they defeated?" I ask.

"Aye," she says. "The Dragonborn took Ulfric's head himself. He has a commission in the Imperial Army."

"Does he?" I am surprised.

She seems startled. "Yes, of course. Haven't you heard the songs? He has the honor to be a Legate."

"He works for the Empire?"

She begins to respond, but then she hesitates. "Well… no. I mean, I don't know. I don't think they pay him. And they never tell him what to do, of course."

"Of course," I echo. Who would? Who would tell the Horned Man what he can and cannot do?

"I think it's more… I think he just wears their colors, and…"

"An alliance of convenience," I say. "He gets the rank. And they get to say he sided with them." My voice is soft.

"It's not just that," says the girl, blustering. "It's _necessary_. The Stormcloaks are shortsighted. Something had to be done to halt the Dominion. He often says…" She stops, looking quickly at me, then down at the camp. "I didn't realize anyone still flew that banner. They're probably no better than common bandits now."

Below, one of the soldiers has noticed us. "You're trespassing here!" she calls up to us. "You'd better clear out!"

The girl tenses beside me. Her hand rises toward her sword's hilt. "There aren't many. And they're weak."

"Not worth the trouble," I say, turning aside.

She pauses. "But they're Stormcloaks. We should… "

"Their commanders are surprisingly durable. Some sort of training in ignoring pain. They take a long time in dying. Better we press on."

"How do you know all that?" She hurries to catch up.

"I've met their kind before."

There is a pause before she replies. "I thought you didn't know anything about the war."

"About the war? No. But I remember the flag." I look back at her. "It's like you said. No better than common bandits."

We walk on in silence.

As the day grows old, we come to more pleasant country. White birches shed crisp golden leaves in our path. One catches in the girl's hair, and she makes a production of trying to get it out without sacrificing her dignity. When the path rises toward the heights again, we turn North and begin to descend. According to the girl, it is here that we shall rejoin the road that will take us to Shor's Stone.

We are a long time in the foothills, and night falls. As dusk slips about us, I begin to breathe easier. The girl is not so serene.

"We should find a place to set up camp," she tells me. "It's getting dark. And I mislike the look of those clouds."

I had intended to travel on into the night. But I am growing weary earlier than I should. Perhaps another night's rest would help me recover my full strength. "Very well."

As I speak, there is a huffing noise in the dark. The girl stiffens. "Bear," she whispers. "Back off. Slowly."

I ignore her, walking forward toward the noise. I cannot see the animal in the gloom, not from this distance, but I can hear his heavy paws as he approaches. I can smell the reek of him, the heavy musk of wet fur and old fish. As he looms up out of the black, twelve feet of roaring fury, he comes not as predator but as a player on the stage, entering precisely on his cue. I judge my moment, stepping around his ungainly swipe. As he falls back to all fours, I take the pommel of my sword in my free hand and swing once. Once is all it should ever take, for a beast.

The brute falls forward, lurching and twitching drunkenly. These creatures are tenacious. Even with so much steel embedded in his skull, he refuses to admit defeat. I let him have the sword, and it flops obscenely back and forth as he shudders through his final protests to his own mortality. At last he lies still, and I place a foot on his muscular neck to wrench the blade free.

The girl approaches as I do it, lowering her shield and her sword. She looks unsurprised to see the corpse. "W-well done," she says.

"He may have a den nearby. That should serve for a camp, yes?"

She nods, crouching beside the bear. "Big one," she says. "You could sell the claws for good money."

"Take whatever you want." I turn away, crouching to feel at the earth. I find the pawprints easily. Tracking is so simple in this muddy land.

Behind me, the girl rises to follow, but before she leaves the bear, she murmurs "poor old fellow" very faintly. Maybe she thinks I cannot hear.

After some searching, we find the lair, an outcropping of stone at the base of a cliff. It will do little for protection, but it should at least shelter us from rain or wind, and it is open enough that the bear's stink is not bad. The girl leaves to gather firewood and I pull off my armor, tossing it in a heap beside me. I rebind the wrappings about my face to hide the blood, and tug my sleeves over my hands. When the girl returns, I am sitting with my back against my pack, my legs stretched out before me. She peers at me through the night, but when I look back she hastily sets about building the fire. She does not ask for help, and I do not offer.

The fire snaps and smells of musk and evergreen. Tiny sparks rise like errant dreams, fading as they encounter the vastness of the night. The girl removes her armor piece by piece, checking each in the firelight before stacking it carefully beside her. Beneath, she wears a sleeveless jerkin and breeks.

For all that she is still a stripling, I am impressed by her size. I had thought that the pauldrons exaggerated her build, but I was mistaken. Her shoulders and arms are perhaps the heaviest I have seen in a female, and her calves are like the trunks of young trees. She is an uncouth thing, but all the same I cannot deny the latent power in her body. She reminds me of the bear's brutish, awkward force. But where the bear never had grace, she is young enough and still might learn to temper her power with speed and skill. She will be dangerous then.

She turns from her armor and begins to fuss over her sword. I grow bored with watching and take up one of her pieces of firewood. I draw my belt knife and begin to carve. The wood is harder than expected, but I can shape it. I find some calm in the work. It reminds me of the many times I have done it before, working by touch in the deeps.

Time passes. We eat from our bags and attend to our tasks, saying nothing. The moon is long risen before the girl puts aside her shield and breaks the silence. "I can't even see you in the dark there." She tries a laugh, but it is weak and hollow.

"Because you've been looking into the fire," I tell her. "Light makes you strong in some ways. But it weakens you in others."

"Dangerous not to have a fire in the wilderness," she says.

"Only if your enemies fear you more than you fear them. Unless you can chase the dark away entirely, all you ever say is 'I am here.'" I pause to blow away a curling strip of wood. It drifts into the flickering ring of firelight, milky pale. "And there's no fire that can fill all the night."

She hesitates. "Well. It's cold, too."

I smile faintly in the dark.

The girl's eyes fall on my peelings. "Were you whittling?"

"Yes."

"My f… someone I knew used to whittle. What are you making?"

I toss it to her. She fumbles it and has to catch it between her forearm and chest. When she lifts it to the firelight, she makes a little noise. "The bear?"

"Yes."

"It's… you're not bad," she says, turning it over in her hands. "Were you an artist?"

"No. You can put it in the fire. It's finished." I sheathe my knife and pick up my skin of water, taking a long draught. It feels cool and gentle on my throat.

"Roke," she says, and her voice is a strange contrast of hesitation and bombast, "the things you did on the mountain. Are they part of the Way of the Voice?"

"Yes."

She breathes out softly. I think she is relieved. "You must have been a pupil there for a while."

"For some time, yes."

"Have you known… _him_ for very long? You must have been there when he first arrived."

I stiffen slightly. Is this a test? "No. The masters met him alone. I only saw him later. And I never really knew him."

"Of course," she says. "That makes sense." She sounds faintly pleased, or perhaps relieved. Ah. So that's the way the wind blows. I almost laugh.

"Tell me about him," I say.

"Oh," she says, and a note of pride enters her voice. "Well, what can I say? He is the Dragonborn, the Thane of All Holds. He's a warrior without peer. He…"

"So I've heard," I say, keeping my voice gentle. "But what is he like?"

She blinks. "I…" She frowns, as if in thought. "He laughs," she says at last. Her voice is softer now, more genuine. "He always laughs."

I feel a prickle on my skin, remembering. "Oh?"

She shakes her head. A faint, fond smile is spreading across her face, softening her stern features like some creeping rot. "He laughs at it all. All the monsters. All the bandits and the war. He just laughs. I've seen him walk into a den of frost spiders and just… laugh. I don't know that he fears anything."

"Not even death?"

She giggles, a surprisingly feminine sound. "I think he'd be more angry than afraid. He's the bravest man I've ever known. Once… once he decided he wanted to get an ice wraith in a bag. I don't know why. I don't know that he did either. But he wanted it. And he got it. I thought we never would, but I should have known better. Maybe no one else could, but he did. Damned if he didn't. He caught an ice wraith in a bag." She starts laughing again.

"And then… then… it was just, just _bobbing_ around there." She mimes it with her hands. "And he said… he said 'that's a start. Now find me six more, and I think I can float.'" She shakes her head, still smiling. "I heard one of the bards sing a song about him once. I… well, I can't sing. But I can say it." She clears her throat.

" _You came to us condemned and bound in iron._

 _You came to us a beggar man but then_

 _You changed into a hero out of legend,_

 _For nothing is with you as other men."_

The girl hesitates. "I think she was right. Nothing's the same way with him as it is with other men. He's… different. Chosen. Sometimes I wondered… I wonder… if he even can die. He's been to Sovngarde once, and returned."

"Anything that lives can die." She looks up, startled, and I press on. "Or so I fear. But what ever happened to the ice wraith in the bag?" I force jocularity into my voice. "Did he ever float?"

She blinks. "Eh? Oh. No. We couldn't find any others. He killed it."

"Ah."

"He'd… he'd like you, I think," she says. "He'd laugh at you. But he'd like you."

Maybe he already is laughing. But he won't laugh forever. "We should sleep," I tell her. "We rise early."

The girl nods and settles down into her bedroll, folding her cloak over her and clutching the fabric close. In the firelight, I can see that someone has embroidered her name over the garment's left breast. Did she do it herself? I doubt it. Who then? A father? A mother?

I lean my head back against the rocky wall. I have no cloak. I have no fire. My coverlet is the cold stone and the naked night. All the same, it was given to me as surely as the girl's cloak was given her. And betwixt our two gifts, mine is the one that shall never fail.

I close my eyes and sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 3.

 **Redbelly Mine. The Army of the Dovahkiin. Borgakh and Sylgja. The letter opened. The massacre at Shor's Stone.**

Shor's Stone teems. The houses are laid out much as they were in Ivarstead, but an infestation of ramshackle tents and lean-tos has clotted in around them. Three men sit by a cookfire barely off the road, and as the wind shifts the scent of grease and charred flesh envelops me on a cloud of fetid smoke. The noise is colossal, a gut punch of fragmented shouts and grunts and shrieking laughter, with a warbling, off-key flute working its way into the crevices of the cacophony. I cannot see the flautist, but somehow his music has followed me since my arrival, omnipresent and grating.

"What is all this?" cries the girl. She has to shout to be heard over the jostling crowd. "What's happening?"

I take a passing woman by the arm. She is heavyset and smells of old sweat. "What is all this?"

"What?!"

I feel bizarrely polluted as I join my own shout to the pandemonium. " _What. Is. This?_ "

She laughs. "What does it look like?" she says, and spreads her meaty arms as if to envelop the world. "This is an army!"

"Whose army?"

She indicates a ragged banner hung between two tents. It is rough homespun, pale grey, and in its center is a dragon daubed in black. I have seen many banners since coming to this land, most of them gaudy things with gilt thread and tassels. This is different. It is crude and ill-made and somehow chilling. There is a primal force to the jagged black shape amidst the bleak and stormy grey. I know it for his.

The girl is slower, of course. "The Empire?" she says, blinking.

The fat woman snorts through her nose. "Well, they wanted it to look similar, true enough. But the wings are out, see. It's the symbol of the Lord Dovahkiin, the sigil he's taken for his own."

"He has an army?" says the girl.

The woman crosses her arms, revealing elbows scaled with dead, pallid skin. "This country's going to shit," she says, moving aside for two men with buckets to pass her. "Anyone can see that. Beasts running wild on the king's road. Dragons taking what they please. Falmer crawling out of their holes, carrying off our children. You can't go from one town to another without some damn thing attacking you. That's not right. That's no way to make a life."

She gestures at the flag. "There's one man doing something about it. Just one. Guards don't do shit unless whatever it is comes right into a big town. They don't care. It's all about protecting the rich jarls. No one gives a damn about the people in this land but the Lord Dovahkiin. He's out there every day. Making this land safe again."

"And you?" I say. "How do you fit in?"

"We stand ready!" she says loudly, and all who overhear give rowdy cheers, as if it's a motto. "One day he'll call. And we'll wash this land clean."

I can imagine so vividly how my sword would shudder in my hands as it rent this flabby cow in twain. "I would greatly like to meet him. The Dragonborn."

"Then you've come to the right place, friend."

My heart leaps. "He is here?"

"What?" She looks startled. "No. No, of course not. The time hasn't come yet. But it will. One day, it will come." She looks aside, distractedly. "We stand ready."

"You said." My voice drips venom, and I can't stop it. I am bitterly disappointed. I chose wrong, and now he is far, far ahead. "I'm looking for a woman. Sylgja."

An expression of distaste worms its way over the zealot's slack features. "Her? She'll be in the mine." Her manner has soured, and she gives us an ugly look as she shoulders past. Sylgja is unpopular, it seems.

I am forced to wade through a tide of sheep before I reach the shadowy entrance to the mine, and when I do it seems all but abandoned. Torches still burn, but no one mans the abandoned picks and shovels lying against the walls. Dull, repetitive clinks of iron on stone are the only noise, echoing back to us from far away down the tunnel.

"How about that, eh?" says the girl, huffing a laugh. "Where do you suppose all of them came from?"

"And what will be done with all the empty sties?"

She frowns. "You should not speak of them so," she tells me. "Maybe they're not rich or important. But they believe in something. They are valiant."

"Would the Dragonborn approve of them?" Let her chew on that bone, and stop barking at me.

"I don't know," she says. "I… I doubt not that he would find something to admire in a stout heart. At least he wouldn't be cruel."

"Is that what I am? Cruel?" I find myself more amused than concerned.

She bares her throat immediately. "I said not so. I do not know where you come from, what you have seen. Perhaps you have reason to doubt them."

"I do." But I am also cruel.

We break off our conversation as we approach the end of the tunnel and the woman who works there alone. She wears a threadbare white shirt that adheres to her back with sweat. Shaggy dark hair flops around her head as she swings her pick. Her motions are jagged and aggressive, harder than necessary. She does not hear our approach over the clamour of her work until we are almost upon her. Then she whirls toward us, half-raising the pick.

Her revealed face is marred by a thick coating of grime and a livid bruise around one eye, but despite it all she is startlingly pretty. Perhaps she is the Horned Man's woman after all.

"Who are you?" she asks, keeping the pick between us. Her gaze darts here and there like a hummingbird, fixing on weapons and packs. "What do you want from me?"

"We've come to deliver a message," I tell her.

Her eyes narrow. "What kind of message?"

"Letters," the girl breaks in. "From the Dragonborn." She has already taken off her pack, and now she sets it down on the ground, bending to undo the ties.

"Never mind that," says the woman. She lowers the pick, turning away. "I already know what they say."

The girl looks foolish. "You do?"

The woman's laugh is like breaking stone, sudden and rough. "Of course. One from my father. One from my mother. And one from _him_. That right?" She turns away and swings at the wall.

"It… yes," says the girl awkwardly.

"Couldn't come himself, of course," the woman grunts, swinging again. "Too damn cowardly to look me in the face."

I am interested. The familiar disappointment of a dead end has been growing in me, but now it begins to ebb.

"Coward?" says the girl, rising. Her hand drifts to her sword's hilt. "You would do well not to insult a hero of Skyrim in my presence. He is no coward."

"What else would you call this?" says the woman. She misses the wall and lurches a step forward, then pauses to lean on the pick. "My mother's dead because of that bastard, and all he can manage is a couple of his damn lackeys with a letter."

The girl blinks and mouths stupidly.

"Your mother?" I say.

"Yes." She turns and swings from the hip, all her force behind it. The iron rings like a bell against the stone and she sags in the aftermath. "My mother. Anneke Crag-Jumper. Ever heard of her?"

"No."

"Of course you haven't. _No one_ has. Her glory days were twenty years ago, and all the glory happened in her head. I remember she'd… I remember her sitting by the fire and telling all these _stories_ , and they'd just grow bigger and bigger each time. Drove my father mad. She was a silly old woman. No one knows that better than me." Her hands tense on the pick again, and she begins to swing in a vicious flurry. "But she _didn't. Deserve._ To _die!_ "

Iron chimes. Gravel patters to the floor. The miner's chest heaves. Breaths hiss between her teeth.

The girl stands stricken and still for a long breath in the echoing aftermath. Then she squares her shoulders. "I am sorry for your loss. But if she fell gallantly…"

" _Fuck_ gallantry!" The woman wheels around again, abandoning the pick to take three rapid steps toward the girl. "And fuck honor and Sovngarde and all your self-righteous _horseshit_. My mother had no business fighting monsters. Everyone saw that, _including_ the glorious Lord fucking Dovahkiin. But no, he needed another of his sycophantic pack mules, so what did he care? Wouldn't have taken much. Just a little flattery. Just taking her seriously, just…"

Her eyes glisten, and her mouth twists. She turns her face from us. "Just go away. Leave me be."

The girl is angry now, snorting through her snout. I would not be surprised to see her paw at the dirt with one foot. "First you will take back those words."

"Or what?" says the woman. "You'll kill me too, orc?"

The girl stiffens. "I will defend the honor of my friend."

"Oh. Your _friend_ , is he?" the woman sneers. "You poor stupid bitch."

The girl lurches forward with an incoherent bellow. I seize the back of her gorget and bring her to a halt so sudden her feet explode out from underneath her in a spray of gravel. She almost falls, and has to lean against me to steady herself. Her expression as she looks back is all mindless fury, and for a moment I am tempted to alter it by force.

Instead I tell her what I must. "You forget yourself."

"She... she has offered me… insult…"

"She's clearly mad with grief," I say.

"Oh, fuck you too," says the woman, stolidly unhelpful.

"... and she is no match for you," I tell the girl. "She has no armor. Her weapon is pathetic. It would not be… fitting."

The girl is wheezing with the exertion of thinking it through. "Let go of me," she grunts at last, tearing herself away. She casts a final baleful glance at the woman, then turns away and scoops up her pack. "I apologize," she says stiffly. "I should not have done that. But you're wrong. You're wrong about… about everything. It's not like you say."

The woman turns away and leans over for the pick. "Whatever. Just go. Those other idiots will tell you things you'll like better anyway."

The girl makes an angry noise in her throat and turns away. "Are you coming?" she asks me.

"In a moment." I move forward. "I don't know what the Dragonborn is or isn't. But I need him to kill a dragon. I need to find him. Will you tell me when he was last here?"

The woman looks away. "A month, maybe? He drops by every once in a while. Don't know what he finds so interesting about this place. But he comes back now and then. Used to be I was happy to see him." Her laugh is bitter and cold. "He's a charming son of a bitch, if nothing else."

She's lying to me, at least in part. I can hear it. I should strike. Now. But the girl is still here. Do I need the girl any longer? Perhaps. I don't know. No, she could still be useful, and besides, she lends me legitimacy. No one could look at her stupid homely face and suspect her of conspiracy.

"Did he say anything about where he was headed?"

"No," she says. Lying again. "Now go away."

I consider. But then, I do not like how complicated this could turn. And she isn't going anywhere.

"As you wish." I turn away and the girl follows me out of the mine.

The town is too crowded, so we camp outside it, a little way down the road in a copse. The evening is fine, and it does not seem we shall need any further shelter. I settle myself against a tall white birch and try to find inner stillness despite the constant chatter of the world. The sighing of wind, the rustle of the leaves, the twitch and chitter of squirrel and bird and cringing shrew. It's maddening. If I could have only an instant's rest, I feel I could recover some essential balance. Once my fury at losing my quarry would have been fierce and blazing and pure. I could have used the fire of it to spur me on. Now it is only an aching disappointment, sullen and diluted.

The girl is withdrawn, muttering to herself as she builds her fire. It takes her nearly half an hour before she achieves even a miserably smoky little flame. Her shoulders hunch, and sometimes she grunts angry invectives at the air. At last, after we have eaten in silence, her self-control breaks.

"She's a small-minded fool," she says. "Her mother. What about her mother? If she chose to follow him, then she knew what she was getting into. Besides, he probably didn't even know. Said herself the old woman was delusional. Probably just followed him, got herself hurt."

That wasn't what she said, but I nod.

The girl seems to take that as an invitation to continue. "He can't be everywhere at once. And he can't save everyone. And he's not... I mean… it's not like he'd just use someone and throw her away. He's not like that. He's a hero."

"Forget the miner," I say. "She just needs someone to blame."

"I know that!" says the girl sharply, unwilling to be soothed until she's worked through every tedious inch of her emotions. "That's why I said she's small-minded. Can't look beyond herself. I have a mother too, but even if she died, I wouldn't start seeing things that weren't there."

"Wouldn't you?"

The girl frowns, but not in anger. "You… said something about a family," she says awkwardly. "Before. I don't mean to pry. But your mother. Is she…"

"She's dead," I say. Oh so dead. There is a weeping sore in my mind where the memory lives. Every time I touch it, I can taste the blood again.

The girl shifts her feet. "Mine is alive," she says. "But she… she does not approve of this. Of me."

I am silent.

"I was to be married," she blurts. "Everyone expected it. Everyone wanted it. I… I didn't have the strength to tell them no. It shames me to say it, now."

She shakes her head, and a little smile touches the corners of her wide mouth. "But then _he_ came. He woke the warrior heart in me. It might have slept all my life if not for him. I… I will always be grateful. He believed in me, when no one else did."

I keep us moving before we can lapse into more rhapsodies about the Horned Man. "And your family?"

"They… they were not best-pleased," she says. "I don't… I don't know that I could go back to them. To my home. Not now." She shakes herself like a dog. "But that does not matter. I do not need to go home. My sword belongs to the Dragonborn now."

"So you mean to stay with him."

"Until death takes me." She says it so proudly. "Is there anyone worthier that I might follow? He is the greatest of men. And still he cared for someone… someone like I was." She actually blushes.

Nausea is coiling in my insides. If I have to listen to any more of this saccharine bleating, I shall cut her down and damn the consequences. "We still have to find him."

She nods. "Riften, then. First thing in the morning."

I nod absently. I need to wait until the girl is asleep before I return to Shor's Stone. For now, I need to get away from her. She is angering me, and I can't afford to let it show. I turn away, mumbling something about firewood.

"Roke?"

I pause.

"I am sorry. About your mother." There is not a trace of ostentation in her voice. I can hear so many things, and I hear the raw places in it, the vulnerability. She thinks that she has shared enough that we can be friends. Stupid child. I leave her standing there by her pitiful fire, face dull and confused and sad in the failing light.

I stay away for some time, long enough that the moon rises and the noises of dusk fade change to those of night. When I return, I find that the girl is already asleep. She frowns against the crook of her arm as if her dreams discomfit her. For a few strange moments, I find an odd curiosity in watching the spasmodic twitch of her dreaming eyes beneath their heavy lids, wondering what they see. But it is only a passing fancy and I move past. I take the letters from her pack.

My armor is no longer necessary. I leave it in its heap and drop my boots beside it. The forest floor is soft under my feet, and I could almost weep with the relief of moving soundlessly again. I had not realized until this moment how much I have come to hate the thud-thud-thud of hobnails to announce my every step.

Though the moon is high and the hour is growing later, it is not long before I reach the first cookfire. Three sit and tell stories. A small man cackles so wildly it seems he must run out of air before he runs out of mirth. Dribbles of ale glisten in his beard like wormy lines of silver in a mine's wall. I keep to the black beyond the ragged edge of firelight. No one looks over as I slip past.

I bear witness to more scenes of revelry. Dice clatter in cups of stiff leather, and men and women shriek and guffaw at the results. Others have taken to the bushes and trees in the empty night, giggling and moaning as they mindlessly rut. And everywhere is the Horned Man. His titles are a constant susurrus from one mouth or another until it seems they whisper from every corner and crevice. In the brief silences of every carousing group and the flickering shadows of every snapping fire, he is there. Unseen, unacknowledged, but so potent. He dominates these low creatures with the very wind of his legend.

No one speaks his name. They must know it, even as I do. But they do not use it. They call him Dragonborn, the Lord Dovahkiin. Sometimes Harbinger, or Archmage, or Thane. One greasy stick of a woman sings of him as the champion of her god. But they do not utter his name. Nor do I. Nor does the girl, for that matter. I wonder why that is. It troubles me to think that I may share something, however minute, with these pathetic little people who cast their hearts and wills like rose petals in his path. But then, these people are too much in awe of him to speak the name. For them, it would be too familiar. For me it is the opposite. Names are for my people, for the brethren. We never gave names to the beasts and the foes. They did not deserve them. He does not. And he never will.

This town sags at the seams with holding all of its newfound inhabitants, yet one house stands alone. No tents or lean-tos abut its walls, and the grass is bare for a good seven steps in any direction. Its moat of emptiness marks it out from the others like a brand. Outcast. Unbeliever. Unloved. I slip through the dark and press myself against the wall. Smoke rises from the crude clay chimney, but shutters and door are closed against the dark. I do not doubt she's barred both. But that is no matter to me. Her roof is thatched.

I place my sword between my teeth and leap to catch the edge of the beam at the rear corner. I draw myself up to crouch atop it, swaying slightly in the night wind. Even if the beam groans, I do not think I shall be overheard. Below me, the stones that hold the thatching in place clack and jitter against each other on their rough twine. In the distance, the revelries grumble on. I move out slowly, easing my weight from one foot to the next until I am over a likely-looking spot in the thatching. I take my sword from between my teeth and cut away a ragged lump of straw, then another and another until I can see into the room below.

The miner is asleep on a straw pallet. Her fire has burnt low, and it paints strange ruddy shadows on the walls. I drop through the thatching and into the room, landing whisper-soft in a crouch. My sword is thirsty in my hand, but the woman does not stir. Her face seems haggard and pale now that it is not animated by emotion. She has washed away some of the filth, but the colorful bruise only stands out all the more vividly for the lack of competition. She sleeps naked tonight, her clothing hung to dry before the fire, and I can see more bruises running down along her ribcage. They kicked her once she was down. Perhaps an attack was inevitable if she so openly despises their hero. All the same, I am surprised. If the attack has already come and she remains so defiant as she was earlier today, then she must have a very stubborn streak. She will not be easily cowed. That is a potential problem.

I cross to her bedside. She has no blankets to conceal a weapon, and though it could be under the pillow her arms are too far away to reach it quickly. Good. I kiss the sword's edge against her throat, and cover her mouth and nose with my hand.

The woman awakes, thrashing against me. I draw blood, and she stills. A trickle of crimson runs down her throat to the frantic pulse of her artery, where it jitters and begins to drip onto the mattress.

"There are two kinds of people in my world," I tell her. "Those who are mine, and those who are not. Those who are mine follow my will. I have no reason to harm them. Do you understand? You may nod."

She nods. Her eyes are very wide.

"Good. I am going to remove my hand. It is my will that you do not scream." I remove my hand. She does not scream. Instead she stares at me, breaths shuddering past tight lips.

"Good. Now. Where is the Dragonborn? Whisper your answer. I have good ears."

" _I don't know_ ," she rasps.

Truth. Strange. "When was he last here?"

" _A month ago_." She bares her teeth. They are white as bleached bone. " _I told you that already."_

"You know me?"

" _I know your accent."_

I keep forgetting about the accent. A childish mistake. "You were lying to me before. Once when I asked how long ago you saw him. And once when I asked where he is now."

She is quiet for a moment, face gone ruminative. As I suspected, she has quickly mastered her fear. There is iron in this one. Questioning it is, then. But before I can move, she speaks.

" _You're his enemy?_ "

There is no point in denying it. "Yes."

" _Then let me up. I'll tell you what you want to know._ "

I smile. "Tell me from there."

She meets my eyes. "No."

Oh, woman. I told you the rules. Why do you people never listen? Still, I need the information first. I withdraw my sword and step back. She sits up, rubbing at her throat and looking down for a long moment at her red-stained palm. At last she settles herself, crossing her legs on the bed and lacing her hands together in her lap. Before she can grip tight, I see her fingers trembling. So, not fearless. Brave.

"He really did come a month ago," she said. "Or near enough. But I made out like I didn't know why." She takes a deep breath before continuing, releases it in a shuddering hiss through her teeth. "He told me not to tell. But I don't care anymore. It's because of them. Out there." She gestures at the wall. "He has some kind of plan for them."

"Obviously. They're his army."

"Not like that. I'm explaining it wrong." She chews on her lip as if thinking. "It started maybe three months back. Just a couple at first. New faces at the inn. Hired out with the mine. Some of them moved out to other settlements too, looking for work, but they'd keep coming back here to check in. Then there were more. And more. At first we didn't know what was going on, but when we started asking we found out that he'd sent them. From wherever he found them, he sent them here."

Her face is grim. "I… didn't think more about it after that. I thought if they were _his_ , that was just… fine. It's so hard not to admire him. He's a magnificent man. He's like a fire in winter and everyone just huddles close wanting what he has. And if he laughs, you want it to be at a joke you made. If he sighs, you want it to be at a story you told."

"You were his lover."

She flushes. "Yes. No. I don't know. I don't think it meant anything to him. I don't think he expected it to mean anything to me."

I lose interest. "Tell me more about the army."

She looks up. "It's… there's something _wrong_ with them. They don't think about anything but him. They don't talk about anything but him."

"According to you, that's not uncommon."

"Not like this. I've heard couples outside, sometimes, when they're looking for a quiet place to do it. I've heard them _both_ say his name during. And neither of them cares. It's not natural."

"And then he came to see them?"

"Yes," she says, chewing her lip again. "but he wouldn't let them know he was there. He's got so many tricks now. He can be invisible if he wants. He stayed with me while he was here, told me I wasn't to tell anyone he was around, or why he'd come. But he wanted to know about the army. Who'd been here longest. What they thought about him. If any had left and not come back."

"And your answers?"

She shakes her head. "They wouldn't leave. They love him. They'd die for him. And they think that this is where he wants them to be."

"What did he say to that?"

"He laughed. He always laughs."

I am curious, but I ignore it. The army is nothing to me. "And your second lie? Where is he?"

"I don't know," she says again. "He went out one day and when he came back he… wasn't happy. Not… not _angry_ really, just… he's usually so contented. So satisfied with everything. It's like the world just bends over backwards for him."

"Or just bends over," I murmur.

She doesn't notice, too caught up in her tale. "But this time he was disappointed. Aggravated. Kept muttering to himself. He ended up standing in front of my map for about half an hour. Then he cut into it. Two places. He left the knife stuck in the wall, and then he just turned and left. Not even a goodbye." She bows her head, voice tightening. "The courier came a few weeks later. My father, writing to tell me about my mother."

I have heard more than enough about her idiot mother. "Where's the map now?"

She gestures mutely to the wall beside me. The knife has been removed, but there are still two deep slits in the fabric. One over High Hrothgar. The second over Riften. Riften. Damn it. What could he be looking for there? According to the old men, he was only asking them for locations of new words in the dragon speech. Is there a word wall in Riften? No, he knew about Riften before going to High Hrothgar. Perhaps whatever he was looking for in High Hrothgar, he didn't find it.

"That's all I know," says the woman. "And I hope it helps you. He deserves some grief."

I pull the letters from my gambeson and toss them onto the bed beside her. "Read his words."

Her expression grows stony. "I'm done with that bastard. Read it yourself."

"I can't."

She frowns. "You can't read?"

I am silent.

Her frown deepens. "Fine. Whatever." She scoops up one of the letters and tears it open. " _Sylgja_ ," she reads, " _I write with the worst of news. You may know that your mother bore arms beside me of late. It is my bitter duty to tell you that she has fallen in battle with a rogue giant. I intend to tell you myself, but danger besets me and if I am unable to come in person, I will send this with a courier. Know that she was very gallant, and I shall not soon forget her._

 _I fear that this letter may cause you much grief, but my thoughts are with you. Remember the good times, and look for me as Autumn turns to Winter. Some people bearing my standard may be coming to Shor's Stone before then. Welcome them as you would welcome me, or your dear mother returned to you, for they all bear a hero's heart like hers."_

Her voice is trembling with suppressed rage by the end of it. She stops speaking, but does not lower the page. "There's a postscript," she says at last. "But I can't read it."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know the alphabet. Strange symbols…"

I cross quickly toward her, and she flinches back at my coming. I take up the letter. For a moment, I do not know what I am seeing. I have never seen them sketched before, only felt them engraved. But in the end I recognize the words.

 _Come find me_.

He's played me. The whole time, he's played me. Maybe he didn't know exactly what would happen, but all the same my movements have been accounted for by some contingency. And once again, he is a step ahead. Taunting me. Mocking me. I curl my fingers slowly around the letter, crumpling it. It is too hot in here. Stifling. The fire blazes at me, hungry, trying to seep into my flesh and pollute my being. I need cold to think, to process. I can't think like this.

"What?" says the woman. Her voice has changed. "What is it?"

The letter makes it seem he cares for her, but she tells me he does not. What does that mean? Does he intend for me to kill her now on the evidence in the letter? Perhaps that is all I have ever been - simply his custodian, cleaning away allies who have outlived their usefulness. Or is that what I am meant to think? Perhaps he is backhandedly attempting to protect her. How deep do his intrigues go? Can it really be possible that he knows me so well?

"You have what you came for," says the woman, voice taut and anxious. "I wish you well, but I don't want anything to do with it after this. It's not my business anymore."

I hiss a laugh. "Not your business? Fool." I gesture at the rent map. "This is a gameboard. You are my piece or you are his."

Her face grows pale. "I won't be used," she rasped. "I will _not_ be used."

Talking, talking. Everyone talking. The girl, this woman, the fools outside. Everyone bleating about the Horned Man and what he wants. His will. His power. Damn it, why can't I _think_ …

Then it becomes clear. It doesn't matter. His will does not matter. It is a powerful will, so powerful that even I feel its lure. But it does not command me. What the Dragonborn wants me to do is immaterial. Whether he would be pleased or displeased by an action I undertake is none of my concern. If I let his will command my actions, even if it is only to do the opposite of his desire, then I am lost and unworthy of my name.

No. I am myself. I am my will. And I made my decision long before his scrap of insolent paper.

I turn on the woman. She is ready for me and leaps, clawing at my face. Her fingers tangle in the wrappings, wrenching them over my eyes, but my purpose is clear and unmuddled again. I do not need sight. I sidestep, turn, duck a swing of her fist by the kiss of the air driven before it. Then I drive my sword home. Smooth. Clean. The shudder of impact is the caesura on poetry of motion.

Silence.

"Oh," says the woman, hollow and guttural. "Oh no." Weak fingers fumble blindly at my face, and sight returns as my wrappings fall away entirely. I follow the woman to the floor. My sword is driven between her breasts with such force that it has cleared her back by a good two feet. It forces her to lie on her side as she shudders and twitches toward release. Blood seeps from her mouth, staining her white and perfect teeth. "Oh no," she says again.

"I told you," I say. "There are only two kinds of people. You wanted to be free? This is the only freedom."

She meets my eyes. I realize with a shock that if my wrappings are gone she can see my face. Somehow it had not occurred to me before. Now I watch her expression undergo the usual shifts. First a terrible surprise, an awe. Then mounting disquiet behind the eyes. Finally horror, revulsion. Even impaled and dying, she fights to escape from my visage, a reaction even more instinctive than self-preservation itself.

"Look, then," I tell her. "Do you understand? You see it? This is what I am. This is why. This is what it is to bargain with a god."

Her hand closes around my wrist. It is rough and callused from the mines, and leaves a red stain on my flesh.

"No," she says.

It angers me. I cannot say why. Likely she is barely conscious at this point. She is losing a great deal of blood. But it angers me all the same. And I carry out my will in a flash of blind fury, wrenching the blade loose so savagely that I reduce her chest to a ruin. Blood sprays the wall, and she flops back lifelessly, a husk with hollow eyes.

My breathing is ragged. Still too hot in here. Too stifling. Too much. I have to get out. I snatch up my wrappings, but… no. I need to feel cool air on my face. I strike the door with such force that I tear it from its hinges, bar and all. I rush through, tearing my gambeson loose, throwing it aside, falling to my knees. My sword lies beside me, sticky with blood.

The night air is cool. Not cold. Cold would be so much better. But at least it is cool. It is fresh. It helps me. I press my arms against my breastbone, feeling the rapid tattoo of my own heart. I am losing control. I try to examine my own distress, but I know what it must be. He came so close to making me his. For a moment, I quavered on the cusp of becoming one of the bleating sheep of this world, a mere host infested by his will. He almost made me doubt. I was a step away from being one of these mewling dogs…

"Oi." A dog approaches even now. I can hear his clumsy, hobnailed boots. "What the hell are you doing?" His steps hesitate. "Wait. Who are you?"

I raise my face, and I see his eyes widen in the dark. "Holy gods," he croaks.

I am past him before he can so much as grope for his weapon. His body collapses but his head flies in a long arc, landing close to the nearest campfire and rolling into the circle of light. There is a blank, confused stillness. Then the screaming begins.

At first I cut them down where they grovel and plead and struggle clumsily to rise. Blood coats my skin, peppers my eyes. It is hot and aggravating. It angers me, gives my blows force. But even as I rage, I am exalted. My anger is pure again, untempered by all the little failures and the minor concessions. I am myself once more, and the power of that self embraces me. It is glorious, transcendent. I move as if in a dream, and each crisp snap of my arm and my blade describes another perfect line in a deadly calligraphy.

At length they begin to organize, begin to bare steel and crouch together. It does not matter. I leap through the darkness, appear amongst them in a rush, cut them down in a flurry of ecstatic motion that makes my muscles sing. Now they break and try to reform, but it is not my will that they should.

A man falls with a cloven skull, screeching and clawing at empty air. Another tries to flee past me, thinking me occupied. I turn into a low, smooth crouch, driving the point of blade into his crotch and wrenching it free in a spurt of arterial blood. His anguished sobs as he bleeds out play countermelody to the rhythm of my steps as I dash forward, catch a woman by her braid, and open her throat to the bone. She falls past me in a gibbering heap, obscene bubbles rising in the froth of her severed windpipe.

Another woman falls back before me, dropping her axe. "Please no!" she gasps. "Please! I'm pregnant. You can't! I'm pregnant!" She's lying, not that I care. I drive my sword's point through her open mouth and up into brain. Then I wrench it free with a twist, and yellowed teeth glitter in the firelight as they cascade into the dark.

A man rushes me, screaming to split the world. There are words in his howls, but they do not matter. I dance forward to meet him, lunging. He takes the blow well, knocking it aside with his shield, but his follow-up stroke is clumsy and slow, all the way from the shoulder. I slide beneath it and slit his gut open clean and smooth as a razor across a lush fruit. Milky pale guts gush forth steaming and bloody into his groping hands, and his howl changes its timbre. The noise offends me. As I pass, I impale a lung, drowning his breathy screeches in blood.

On and on it goes, until I sway drunkenly between strokes and every breath is searing agony in my lungs. It is perfect. It is my expiation for doubt, and each sweet lash of it envervates my spirit. I find it again, that place beyond calculation or doubt, between pleasure and pain and nothingness. From that lofty pinnacle I seem to see their shrieking, contorted faces from a dreamy distance. And I am become my will, unbound by earthly constraints, free to manifest the awful force of my rage upon the world directly. I am perfect again.

At last I turn from a final beheading stroke and lurch onto one knee, my sword's tip grating against gravel as I look around for the next of them. I find myself alone. The night is empty and there is a terrible silence. With no object, my bloodlust abandons me and in its echoing absence, my body begins to shake and shiver. I sag back onto my heels, wrapping impact-numbed fingers around the quillons of my sword as I gasp. My heart is hammering in my ears. I don't think I could stand if I tried.

The bodies stretch away into the distance, so far that not even my night-trained eyes can follow them to their termination. They lie in a jagged, irregular zigzag, in clumps and piles and swaying lines. They are armored and clothed and naked, and they lie still with blank eyes fixed unwaveringly on unsympathetic stars. I did a rough count when I first came to Shor's Stone. There were thirty-two men, twenty-seven women. Twenty-eight, counting the miner. Sixty in all.

I have slaughtered every one of them. With their passing, I have also slain Shor's Stone. It is gone.

I stagger upright. With shuffling steps I follow the grisly road of corpses until I find the banner, fallen and crumpled and soaking up the blood of its erstwhile bearer. I drag it out from under him and fling it onto the nearest fire. An acrid smell rises as it burns.

In the light of the blaze, I look down at myself. I am clothed in blood. Some is fresh and some is already crusting. My sweat has drawn strange pallid lines in it. The body beneath the foulness does not seem as though it can be mine. It is too thin and taut, hardened by privation. I realize for the first time that I have lost muscle since leaving the deeps. I have weakened. I have become less than I was. How have I not seen this before? I look away. I move on. Near the end of the houses I find a horse trough. I stoop to scrub at my body and my hair until they almost seem clean again.

It is nearly dawn by the time I return to the camp. The fire is long cold, and the girl snores softly. I am dressed in fresh trousers and gambeson. I even cut new wrappings from a sheet. I feel renewed, but also weary. I pull on my boots and then my armor, piece by piece. I set my helm and sword beside me. Then I lie back. Maybe I rest. For a long time, it seems as though for once I can be at peace even in the clamor of this land. The breaking day is awakening the forest around me. The leaves shift and the trees creak in the gusts. The birds are beginning to give voice to plaintive cries that encompass all the loneliness of their miniscule, flame-flicker little lives. And none of it disturbs my equanimity. I lose myself amidst it. I almost feel I could sleep.

The girl twitches awake beside me. I feel it through the earth. I hear her sit upright and yawn. "Roke," she says. "Are you awake?"

"Yes," I say, though I cannot remember deciding to speak.

"It's dawn. Best get under way." She stands. "We want to reach Riften before nightfall."

I open my eyes. The branches cross in an intricate lattice above me, and beyond them the last stars are fading with the coming of the sun. The night is passing away.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 4.**

 **Riften. Mjoll the Lioness. The Guild. The attack in the ratway.**

The wagon's wheels groan with each revolution, and the horses lean into their burden with heavy snorts that fog in the chill of evening. Each time we bump over one of the ruts in the road, the girl's shoulder lurches into me. I accepted the ride several miles back, and I have spent every subsequent inch of road regretting it.

"Won't be long now," the driver assures us. "Just the top of this hill. Hope you find him. I'll be honest, mind you, I didn't hear he came this way. And it's the kind of news that usually moves."

"The Dragonborn often travels in secret," says the girl. She has been almost tolerable lately, but a fresh audience has puffed her up anew. "So as not to reveal himself to his enemies."

"Ah well," says the driver. It seems to be his default reply to anything he does not understand. "I saw him once, you know. The Dragonborn."

The girl is surprised. "You did?"

"Oh aye. He came through Falkreath with the procession, when they were carrying Ulfric's head South. Don't think the place was ever so crowded. I had to sit on somebody's roof just to see it." He pauses, nominally to tug at the reins but probably just for effect.

"He came through right at the front, just behind that old stoat Tullius. Crowd was screaming for him. He was smiling and laughing. Everyone else there was Legion to the core, all grim and fussed like they had shit smeared under their noses. You know the look. Not him. It was him who killed Ulfric, you know. He still had Ulfric's sword, and he kept tossing it in the air. Thought he'd cut himself, but he always caught it clean. I remember that. He always caught it clean. Now there's a man who lives a charmed life."

"The Dragonborn is very skilled," says the girl as though reciting a catechism. I roll my eyes.

The driver nods. "You know the damnedest thing? There were some red-blooded Stormcloaks in that crowd. Later on, they threw some mud at the legion flag. But they behaved themselves when he went past. Some of them even cheered. I never could understand that. There he was, tossing their dead king's sword around like some street juggler, and they cheered him for it. They cheered him."

"He's a hero of more than the war," says the girl. She is a little severe, as if she thinks he's criticizing her precious Horned Man. She's become very tense on the subject since Shor's Stone. "He's the Harbinger of the Companions, the Archmage of Winterhold. He slew the Worldeater Alduin, who… "

"Sure enough, that he did," says the driver agreeably. "I'm just saying, if it was me that killed Ulfric, you wouldn't catch the true blue Stormcloaks cheering for me. Not if I was wearing Tiber Septim's crown and shooting rainbows out my ass. I'd probably be knifed in bed within a week. At the very least they'd be telling me rude things about my mam. But him? Not a peep, not a whisper. Not even a glare. The gods love that man, that's all I'm saying. But here we are."

We have crested the hill at last, and ahead of us Riften hunches against the darkening grey sky. The walls are rough, barely better than simple stockades, but the gates are heavy and bound in iron. The driver halts at the gate, and the girl and I climb out from amongst the wool. The girl waves to the driver, and he returns it with a nod of his head before pulling his horses over toward the stables. I approach the gates.

Two guards sit by a brazier, playing at cards and sipping from steaming cups. One of them rises reluctantly to meet us. "What's your business in Riften?"

"We've come seeking the Dragonborn."

"Your thane," the girl adds. "I am his companion, Borgakh. Called by some Borgakh the Steel Heart. And this…"

"Go on in," says the guard, cutting her off.

As she falters, he chuckles at her expression. "What? You think we bother with _his_ business anymore? Not worth the grief. It's… what do you call it? Something with a p?"

"Policy," grunts the second guard.

"Right. It's policy now. Anything to do with the thane, the thane handles it. So enjoy your stay in Riften." He gives us a mocking half-bow as he sits back down to his game. "Whoever you are."

No one opens the gate for us, so I open it myself. It is heavy, and the hinges groan in distress. The girl and I walk forward into Riften.

I have avoided the cities since coming to this land. At first, when I didn't know the language or the customs, I simply kept to the wilderness, where I could find stragglers and outlaws no one would miss. I did not feel I could walk among these people until I happened on the idea of wearing armor and helm as a disguise. A masked wanderer is memorable, but no one in this land looks twice at another vagabond mercenary in rusting armor.

Even then, I found few reasons to try the cities. I had learned by then that the Horned Man spent far more time in my wilderness than he did in his towns. I entered his world only once, and it was enough. I hated the feel of Whiterun, hated the crowds and the noise. Still, it had a certain grandeur. All of that worked stone made it seem not so much a work of craft as of nature, a force as primal as the mountains or the rivers.

Riften, by contrast, feels oddly impermanent. Spindly bridges bind the town together like the threads of a decaying spiderweb. The houses are not stone but wood, weathered and grey with age. Everywhere is the smell of damp and rot from the water, and aging timbers creak at even the lightest breath of wind. After the imposing solidity of Whiterun, this reminds me of just another shantytown in the wilderness. If the people left Riften behind, water and wind and rot would tear it down in decades, not centuries.

"So this is Riften," says the girl. She sniffs. "It is… not as I expected."

"You've never been here?" I am surprised. Somehow I had assumed everyone in this little land knew the cities except for me.

"I… no," she says. "I have not been this far East before."

In a way, this simplifies matters. If we are both strangers here, controlling the girl will be easier. "Where would the H … the Dragonborn go in this place?"

"He has a house here," she says, "but I don't know where. He said it was on the water, but… well, _everything_ 's on the water."

I lean over the railing to examine the murky river below. A broken bucket is bobbing forlornly against the side of a lower street even more decrepit than the one above. The timbers are black and greasy.

"Perhaps we should try the inn," the girl suggests, pointing across a bridge toward a swaying sign on rusty chains.

I nod, turning away from the water. There are no passersby as we cross the bridge, and though there are the market stalls before the inn, no one mans them. Perhaps it is too late for the merchants here. The girl opens the door, and I step through with relief. The interior smells of sour ale and charred meat. After the odor of the water, it is quite pleasant.

A sallow, dark-haired woman glares pugnaciously as we pass, but no one else seems to notice our entrance. The lamplight is dim and smoky, and the inn's patrons keep their eyes on the bottoms of their mugs. Even the innkeeper, one of those absurd lizard-creatures, has busied itself behind the bar and doesn't look up.

For lack of a more inviting option, I move toward the lizard. The girl follows. She has acquired a brittle swagger, and darts suspicious glances at those we pass.

The lizard straightens as we approach. "If you've got coin, you're welcome here," it says. "Otherwise, hit the road." Its voice is a surprise. I have killed some of these things, but I have never conversed with one before. It sounds like it's forcing the words through a gullet of jagged slate.

"We're looking for the Dragonborn."

"Well, you won't find him here." The lizard's voice grows even harsher, if possible. "He's not welcome. Neither are his friends."

Predictably, the girl stiffens like a setter spotting a pheasant. "You should know before you speak again, sir, that I am the sworn sword of the Dragonborn. If you have a quarrel with him, you have it also with me." She puts a hand to her weapon's hilt.

The lizard is unimpressed. It leans forward, spreading thick scaly hands on the bar. "You best watch how you run your mouth, orc. Maven Black-briar's a regular. You start something here, you won't like what happens next."

As he speaks, I notice that we are not so completely ignored anymore. Various eyes have turned toward us, glittering in the gloom. The girl notices it too, and her shoulders hunch slightly as if beneath a weight. I find it vaguely amusing. "I ask only for respect," she says with a pathetic stab at dignity, "for a hero."

"I'll respect who's earned it, and no one else," the lizard hisses. "You… "

"Here now." A large woman is approaching us, threading between tables. She's armored like a mercenary and carries a large sword slung over one shoulder. Half her face is painted with woad, and the effect in the lamplight strikes an odd balance between barbaric and clownish.

"I know the Dragonborn," she says. "Come sit with me."

"They'll be leaving," says the lizard.

"They'll be sitting with me first," the woman replies. "I'm a good customer, Talen-Jei. You owe me this much."

The lizard hisses, but does not protest further as the painted woman leads us back to a table in the corner. A swart, attractive man some years younger than she is sits waiting for us. He does not stir from his languid posture as we approach, but his eyes twitch furtively. He reminds me of a rabbit.

"Best not to bring up the Dragonborn in here," says the painted woman, dropping into a chair with a gusty sigh.

"Is the innkeeper a Stormcloak sympathizer?" says the girl. "I don't understand… "

The painted woman shrugs. "Talen-Jei? Who knows? I heard it was more the wife who had the problem than him, but that's just gossip." She extends a large hand to the girl, then to me. "Mjoll's my name. This is Aerin." As she withdraws her hand, she places it on his arm, a casually possessive gesture.

I sit. "Where is the Dragonborn?"

"I don't know," she says. "But he _is_ here, I think. You know how it is. He comes and he goes. You're never really sure. But it… _feels_ like him."

"Feels?" says the girl.

The painted woman shrugs. "You get an eye for it after a while. Whenever he's around, everything picks up a bit. Like the world was just strolling along, and suddenly it starts to march. Am I making any sense?"

The girl nods eagerly. "I know what you mean. I'm glad that he has _some_ friends here, at least."

The woman frowns. "Friend? I suppose." Lying. "Well… actually, I don't know."

"Why not?"the girl asks.

She shrugs again, uncomfortable and showing it. "He's not like other men."

"No?" I say.

She doesn't reply. The young man leans forward. "I like the man," he says. "I do. He's been good to us. But we've heard some upsetting things, is all."

The painted woman touches his arm again, quieting him. "He's never been anything but friendly with us. But you do hear things. You've probably heard by now about the Thieves' Guild. Word is something's happened with them. And that upsets things around here. No one really knows what's going to happen. Or when it might start."

"What does this have to do with the Dragonborn?"

She purses her lips, glancing at the girl before speaking. "It's said he's in the Guild now. Maybe even leads it."

"That's a lie." The girl leans forward, glowering.

"I didn't say it's true or it isn't," says the painted woman. "I'm just telling you what people are saying. You should know what you're walking into when you ask about him here."

"It's nonsense," says the girl, sitting back and crossing her heavy arms. "Why would he need to steal? He's rich as a Jarl. I've seen him throw a garnet big as your thumb to a beggar child."

"A few weeks back, I'd have said the same," says the painted woman. "But I know Bersi Honey-Hand, down at the pawn shop. He's a good man, a kind man. Never hurt a living thing. Bad with money, mind you, but only as he's too charitable for his own good. He borrowed Guild money. And he and his wife both swear up and down that when the debt came due, it was the Dragonborn who came collecting."

The girl looks slack and foolish, like a half-deflated leather ball. "He… must be infiltrating them," she says. "Bringing them down from within."

"If the Dragonborn wanted the Guild gone," says the painted woman, "they'd be _gone_. He's as powerful as the Jarl or Black-briar, and he's got the kind of power that's easier to mobilize. Which brings me to another point. The way the powers are set in this place… "

"But it doesn't make _sense_ ," says the girl. "You see it doesn't!"

"Not for most men," says the painted woman, low and quiet. "But he's not like other men. Look, I know what you must be… I followed him too once… "

The girl comes to her feet in a rush, chair screeching back along the floor. "Tell me where his house is," she says.

"Honeyside," says the painted woman. She points. "Out that door, over the bridge, and to the left. The one with all the gardens." She seems weary and subdued. The pretty man takes her hand.

The girl storms off. I lean forward. "You don't think he's in the house."

"No," says the woman. "I don't."

"Where is this Thieves' Guild?"

She is silent for some time, staring at the tabletop. I sense the hesitation in her and let her stew in it. "Don't go looking for them," she says at last. "Maybe someone should find him, get him to stop. But it shouldn't be you. You've just arrived. You can't understand."

"Understand what?"

"There are three powers in Riften," she says. She taps a bony index finger on the table. "The Jarl." A second finger. "Maven Black-briar." A third. "And _him_. The Jarl is the law. Black-briar's the money. And he's… the power. But he's unpredictable. No real ties to one side or the other. Or he didn't have any."

I begin to understand. "But now he's joined the Thieves' Guild."

She nods. Minute cracks appear in the blue paint as she frowns. "And he's shaking things up, too. People say he's making the thieves stronger. Maybe funding or equipping them. That makes the others nervous. The Guild used to be Black-briar's. Or at least, they came when she called. Now no one knows which way he's pushing them. But he won't stay forever. He never does. And when he's gone… "

"Someone gets a lot stronger."

"I have friends in the guards," she murmurs, leaning closer. "They say it's only a matter of time before one of them moves on the Guild. That's what I wanted to tell you. You're new in town, so you deserve to know. Now's not a good time to be _his_ friends. Puts you on the gameboard. _Especially_ if you're seen anywhere near the Guild."

I wonder what the Horned Man is planning. It seems too much to imagine that all of this is coincidental with my pursuit. But ultimately, what do these politics matter to me? "I'm forewarned. Tell me where the Guild is."

"If I do, I might be sending you to your death. The orsimer too."

"I won't come back and haunt you."

She sighs. "They call it the Ratway. Beneath the city. Go down to the lower street. Follow it as far as it goes. There will be a door."

I rise. The woman stops me with a hand. "If you're going, go carefully. And… tell your friend I'm sorry. I think I took something from her."

I look back until she removes her hand. The rabbit man beside her has developed a sickly look, and cringes away from my gaze.

I find the girl standing outside, hunched against the wall and glaring into the gathering night. A single pale lantern illuminates a ragged half-circle beside the inn's door. Insects swarm around the light, casting hazy, flickering shadows.

"I'm sorry I lost my temper," she says. She is almost pitiable like this, nosing foolishly amongst the tatters of her dignity. "I just… I never knew there were so many people who don't like him. Spread rumors. Told tales." She grunts. "Never saw it when I was with him. But I suppose they wouldn't dare say it to his face. None of them."

There is something haggard and desperate in her. I sense her fragility and feel a childish desire to strike out and disillusion her by force. I can't tell if it is impatience or simple malice. But I remain silent. Her imbecilic devotion to the Horned Man is the link between us. And the link makes her tractable. "Come," I say. "Let's try the house."

She nods. "Why do they do it?" she says as we move off into the dark.

I say nothing.

"I mean, there could be a lot of reasons he'd be… that he'd act… hasn't he earned the benefit of the doubt? He's done all those incredible things. And it doesn't even make _sense_. So what is it? Are they jealous?" Her face is contorted into something taut and grotesque as she thinks. "Sometimes I think some people hate anyone who's more powerful than they are. They can't help it. And they look for reasons to keep hating."

"The weak believe what suits them," I reply blandly.

She barely seems to hear. "He… didn't say anything else that you remember?" she said. "Before he left High Hrothgar?"

"Not to me."

She nods, but she isn't happy. That bears watching.

The Horned Man's house is better-appointed than most of the others, but it still resembles a simple log cabin of greying wood. The windows are dark. I hammer on the door. The thuds of impact are flat and seem oddly muted against the groan of wood and the murmur of water, as though the nightly noises of Riften are an exclusive conversation on which no other sound wishes to intrude.

The girl draws erect. I think she is shaking. Is she anxious, or only eager? As I look back at the door, I find myself infected by her tension. A frisson runs silky claws over my skin, and I realize as if for the first time that I might already be within blade's length of my opponent. It is not likely, but it is _possible_. The thought startles me more than it should, and I fight an urge to slip into a fighting stance.

The house is silent. The girl knocks again, harder. Still nothing.

At last, the girl grunts and turns away. Her expression has grown moody. "We should make camp outside the city, come back tomorrow. I'll not give coin to that Argonian."

I turn aside. "Do what you want."

"Where are you going?"

"To the Thieves' Guild."

She blinks foolishly at me for a moment. Then she scowls. "Then you _believe_ her. You think he's a thief."

"I think he has business with the Guild," I say. "I don't know what. I don't care. My goal hasn't changed." Inspiration strikes me. "And you left before the woman could tell you everything. The Guild's days are numbered. The powers here are going to strike it. If we don't move quickly, we might get tangled in whatever happens next."

The girl's glower has melted into a comically aghast expression. "They're… but they _can't_."

"They feel differently."

She looks aside. Her big hands bunch and slacken. "Then I'm coming with you," she tells me. As if I might argue. Her naivete benefits me, and even so I want to slap her.

We start across the creaking bridge. Though the night is young, there are few passersby. A woman scuttles quickly to a door as we approach, head down. She doesn't quite slam it as we pass, but there is an emphasis to the sounds of the latch closing and the bolt being drawn. In the distance, a guard pauses in his perambulations to watch us cross the bridge. His helmet glitters in the light of the torch he bears, but his eyes are pits of shadow. He is terribly still.

The painted woman was right. This city teeters on the brink of collapse. There is a coiled readiness here that lurks behind the noise of water and wind and wood. It is in the shadows of a helm and the flat thud of a deadbolt. It's like the expectant hush before the fall of an axe.

A great house rises in the distance, candlelight dancing in the windows. This must be the Jarl's house. I wonder if she will strike first or if it will be the other, this Black-briar? Black-briar might be losing money since the Horned Man began to play with her toys. But when the he leaves - and he will - is it not likely that the thieves shall slip back into the hands of their former mistress? And they shall return stronger. The Jarl must see that she has more to lose from waiting. I wonder if even now she huddles in her great house, fingers tapping on her sword's grip, brooding on her chances?

The house vanishes as the girl and I descend a rickety staircase to the street below. There are no lights in windows down here, only the wavering glimmer of passing torchlight on black waters. Riften overshadows us on its high stilts, but here beneath it shows its truer self: ugly, half-formed, decrepit. Wind paws through empty windows and ill-fashioned walls. The slats beneath my feet are spongy with rot and scarred with ungentle use.

I cross a crude bridge, and the girl totters after. On the far side, I begin to detect subtle signs of habitation. Old leaves that were left to decay nearer the stairs are fresher here and crunch underfoot. The timbers underfoot are better maintained. I even think I detect some subtle signs of masonry in the wall, though it is too dark to be certain. We are getting close.

We come to the door and I push it wide. It sags on rope hinges, revealing a maw of intense darkness. I slip inside. The girl clanks through behind me. She has unslung her shield and bears it before her, cautious. Perhaps she is wise.

I sink into a crouch as I follow the passage, touching lightly at the walls as I go. The feel of navigating without vision is surprisingly nostalgic, though my armor hinders me. Behind, the girl curses as she fumbles along in my wake. "Roke! Where are you?"

"Here." I am irritated. The floor is level and smooth, the passage straight. Can she not do the simplest of things?

"Wait, please. Just… wait." Her voice is full of badly concealed anxiety.

I could simply leave her. If I do find the Horned Man down here, she may become a liability. Not that she could match me, but if the battle were going badly, she might be able to tip it in her beloved master's favor. But then, she could also be a distraction. She could let me to get close.

As I hesitate, the girl's groping hand encounters my arm. She quickly reaches down to clasp my wrist.

"We should not become separated," she says. "There's a saying among my people. When friends separate, their enemies laugh." She pauses. "It… actually sounds much better in my language. Stronger."

I hesitate, but in the end I draw her with me. There is time yet, and her inane aphorism holds a kernel of truth: once I have cast her aside, she is of no use to me. While I keep her close, she is another potential weapon. I need only fear her if I believe the Horned Man to be more capable than I am. And that I will not believe.

"Just walk," I tell her. "Don't fear the dark."

"I don't fear it," she protests.

"Yes. You do."

"Are you calling me a liar?"

I hiss, annoyed. I'm done pandering to her. It's getting late in the game for such niceties. "You're like that little beast with the spines. Always bristling. Listen now. I'm more experienced than you. Do you deny it?"

"No." Her voice is sullen.

"Then listen. If you make the dark itself your enemy, you won't be ready for the things that are _in_ the dark. Stop fumbling and start following."

She doesn't respond. Her movements improve as we continue, but only marginally. She is a stubborn creature.

"Hedgehog," she says.

"What?"

"It's called a hedgehog. What you said, the beast with the spines. Hedgehog."

I don't reply. It seems to me that I can almost detect her little thoughts swarming around me, whining like the insects circling a flame.

It takes her some time to ask the obvious question. "Roke… where exactly… ?"

The step before me is soft. The faintest of scuffs: a heel? No… ball of the foot, wrapped in a cloth slipper. A wiser assassin would have gone barefoot. The girl is still babbling at me, but not so loudly that I cannot block her out, cannot hear…

The other foot. It lands harder. I duck low, drawing a surprised grunt from the girl. The weapon passes overhead. I feel the wind of it. Too much for a blade. A cudgel, perhaps. My attacker grunts as he overbalances. That is all I need. I form a talon with my free hand and strike his throat. It doesn't take much, only a quick snap of my arm. I don't need him dead, only weak.

As he falls to his knees, I wrench my wrist from the girl's grip and slip behind him, wrapping an arm about his throat and allowing my weight to bear him to the ground.

"What's happening? Roke?"

"Quiet." I am listening. Did this man come alone? I can't sense any others, but after the racket we've been making, a very skillful opponent might have gotten close undetected. I shall have to be cautious.

"Who are you?" I hiss to the prone body beneath me.

"Fuck y'self," he wheezes.

I tighten my grip. "Who are you?" You start with the name. When they give that up, they give up something of themselves. It breaks them, just a little. It gives you a place to start.

" _Mallory_." I ease the pressure, and he gasps. "Fuckin' ell. Delvin Mallory. Happy?"

"Thief?"

"Depends. You a… _agh, Nocturnal's tits_ ,all right. I'm a thief."

I am not entirely able to keep the eagerness from my voice. "Where is the Dragonborn?"

"Don't know what the fuck you're on about."

I make him hurt for that. Not so much because it's a lie, but because it's a bad lie. Lies are part of the craft, but ill-considered lies show he hasn't yet learned to respect me. I teach him. He's a quick study.

"All right. All right. Gods. Left this morning with Brynjulf. Don't know where. Something about a temple. But they'll be back. Could be back already, for all I know."

I'd hoped to catch the Horned Man in the midst of his dealings, but perhaps it's for the best that I can make my preparations before his return. If he really is returning.

"He's coming back?"

"Why the hell wouldn't he? What kind of sense'd that be? Build us up and then just sod off? No profit in that."

This is the closest I've ever been. I need to know more.

Before I can speak, the thief continues. "Oi, listen. I figure you must be Black-briar's crew, yeah? Listen, you tell Maven…"

"I'm not with Black-briar."

"Who then?"

"Myself." I shove the cudgel from his hand and remove a dagger from his belt. He might have other weapons concealed, but they will be smaller and less useful. "What else do you know about him? What are his plans?"

"Don't know nothing." Truth. I grit my teeth.

"Who does?"

"Brynjulf? Hell if I know." Hiding something. I tighten my grip. "Vex! Vex, maybe! She gave him his jobs, back before he got his fingers into everything. Gods' balls… "

"You're going to take us to the Guild."

He manages to be amused. "Oh yeah? Got a death wish, do you?"

"Maybe I just want something stolen."

"Come back later. Guild isn't taking new business partners just now, yeah? We're more discouraging them, you might say. Violently."

"Why?"

"Why? Too many cooks trying to stir this fucking pot as it is."

I'm fast losing interest. "I don't care. Will you guide me or won't you?"

"Fine. Your funeral. Let me up, I'll take you to see the Guild."

Lying. I run my hand down his leg, feeling for the muscle. Then I press his dagger through his leg with deliberate force. His startled howl is an ugly sound, choked through a tight throat. But I hear real fear for the first time. It's like the soft, bell-like aftertone of a nail struck by a hammer. The hammer-blow is unlovely, but the tone has a certain aesthetic appeal. So too does fear. I smile.

"What happened?!" asks the girl. She sounds as though she's teetering on the brink of rashness.

"I cut him."

" _Fuck!_ " he sobs.

"What was he trying to do?!" asks the girl.

"Connive." I climb off him before the blood can begin soaking into my trousers. "I've limited his options."

" _If you think I'm leading you fucking anywhere…_ "

I slide the dagger's tip over the wall beside me. It rasps and jitters against the stone like a last gasp.

His caterwauling breaks off into a strained quiet. The only sound is the girl's rapid breathing from behind us.

"Get up."

He totters to his feet, hissing in pain. "Fuck you," he says, and his voice shakes with malice. "You'll get yours."

"You have at most half an hour before you bleed out. Best hurry."

He begins to stumble ahead, hissing with every step. The girl fumbles for my arm. "What did you do?" she says. Her voice is thin and barren.

"Necessity."

I feel her shudder. "This is _cruel_. This is… not honorable."

"There's a saying about honor and thieves." I start after the thief's lurching steps, forcing her into motion with me.

"But… "

"He ambushed us. Would you have cared if I had killed him?"

She falls silent. Wise again. That's twice today.

We follow the thief through the tunnels to the broken rhythm of his limping shuffle. It is a strange journey. There is so much here that is familiar. The dark. The silence. The scent of blood on stone. I find that my motions have subtly changed, knees bending and stride lengthening in the old way. I wonder how many of my old instincts might return, and how quickly. Some part of me feels at home. But there are so many reminders that I'm not. The girl's grip on my arm aggravates me. I feel handicapped, as if I've been manacled to dead weight; and it discomfits me she can sense my every movement. I would never have permitted such intimacy from the brethren. But even if she released me, it wouldn't be right. For all the shadow and the stillness, this place is nothing more than a mockery of what I remember, a miserable hole where the people above store their waste. It is bastardization.

All the same, I feel a vague sense of loss as we turn a corner and dim torchlight appears ahead of us. As we cross into the glow, the thief sags against the wall for a moment. He is an older man than I had thought. His face is lined and grey with strain. One trouser leg is dark, and he hunches over it to keep his hand pressed to the wound. Each limping step leaves a smear in his wake like a slug's trail. The girl releases me. Her gaze is downcast, as if she reads something in the blood.

We approach a dusty wooden door mantled in the flickering shadows of the torch. Though he continues at the same pace, a subtle tension begins to animate the thief's movements. His steps grow more lurching. His breath comes quicker. He is preparing himself for a final rush. Before he can reach the door, I step up behind him. I let him hear me. He slows.

"This is it?" says the girl.

The thief comes to a halt, sagging against the wall. "Yeah. This is it." He looks back at me. "This the part where you kill me, then?"

I've considered it, but he could still be useful. And the girl's presence complicates matters. "No."

"No?" He raises an eyebrow. "Hnh. Whatever you say." He pushes away from the wall with a groan and totters the last few steps to the door. I follow closely as he opens it.

Bows creak, and two men step forward. Their faces undergo quick shifts as they first recognize their comrade and then realize he is not alone. I place a hand on his shoulder to keep him in the way of any ill-considered shots.

"Who're you?" says one of the archers. "Mallory! Who's this?" His arm is already beginning to tremble with the effort of holding his bow drawn.

The thief tries to speak. I dig my fingers into his shoulder to silence him. "We're looking for the Dragonborn."

"Well, he's not here, is he?" The voice comes from behind the archers, across a kind of manufactured pond. A wooden pier is built out over it, and braziers blaze to illuminate the dark. They cast long, erubescent shimmers over the water toward us, like shadows in reverse. A slim, towheaded woman is enshrined by the radiance behind her, transformed into a figure of light.

"Mallory!" she calls. "You all right?"

"Stabbed me!" he shouts back. "Fuckers _stabbed_ me!"

I place the dagger against his throat. "We just want to talk."

"You want to talk, let him go!" the woman calls.

"Drop the bows."

"Who the hell do you think you are?!" Her voice makes eerie echoes against the water and the arching stone. "You don't come into our place and tell us what to do. I said _let him go_!"

"He's lost a lot of blood." One of the archers can't bear the strain and relaxes his bow arm, shaking it out. The other is gritting his teeth, bow trembling.

The woman hesitates, and there is a note of concern in her voice when she replies. "Mallory! You… "

"I'm _fine_. Do what you need to do, Vex!"

So this is Vex. "We're not with Black-briar," I tell her. "Not with the Jarl."

"Yeah, pull the other one."

"You can't afford to lose fighters on us unless you're sure."

"You think you can take anyone here, you've got another thing coming."

"I took this one." I give the wounded man a little shake. He groans involuntarily, face twisting in pain.

The lighting makes it difficult to distinguish the woman's expression, but her posture grows uncertain. "Fuck. Fine. Drop the bows."

"On the ground," I instruct.

The archers allow the bows to fall. I shove the thief forward at one of them as he rises, and he clumsily catches the staggering body. I kick both bows into the water as I pass. Then I begin the long circle of the room on a lip of stone above the waters. The girl follows.

More thieves crowd the wooden pier, a few more archers among them. I mark them as I pass, though none have yet nocked an arrow. Their expressions are hard and suspicious, but there is more wariness than violence so far.

The towheaded woman waits against the wooden rail overlooking the center of the pool. Everything about her is tautened, like a rope trembling on the verge of snapping. Her arms are folded so tightly across her chest that I find it remarkable she can breathe. The muscles in her calves stand out through her breeks, tensed for sudden motion. Her face is set in lines that age her beyond her years.

"Sapphire. See to Delvin." Even her voice is strained.

A woman leaves at the back, hurrying around toward the archers and the wounded man. The towheaded woman looks to us. "Talk then. What do you want here?"

"We want to find the Dragonborn. You will tell us everything you know. Everything you've seen. And then we will tell you what we've seen."

"Who the fuck cares what you've seen?" Her mouth works excessively as she speaks, as if she's gnawing at her words on their way out.

"You do." I take a step closer. She is a small woman, and I tower over her. "You let her too close, didn't you? Black-briar. Times were hard and you let her get a grip. Now you're trying to shake her off, but she knows too much. Your faces. Your names."

"Bullshit." This time her lips barely move.

"You'd be long gone if you thought you could get out. So now you're waiting on the Dragonborn to conjure up one of his miracles." I keep my voice toneless only with difficulty. "But if something goes wrong, you're going to want to know the way the wind is blowing up there."

Her lips have peeled back from small, white teeth. "You've given this a lot of thought." She leans deliberately forward. "I don't like that. Or you. Who says you get to ask what one of ours does?"

The girl steps forward. "Mistress, I am called Borgakh the Steel Heart. I'm the sworn sword of the Dovahkiin. I promise you, we don't mean any harm to him… ah, _or_ whatever his goals are here. I don't pretend to understand, but… " She pauses, clearly saying something distasteful. "... well, any friend of his is a friend of mine. You see?"

The woman's gaze does not leave me, but when the girl is done speaking, she leans back against the rail and manages a tight shrug. "Fine. Whatever. But only because _he_ won't care either way."

That opinion annoys me, and the woman seems to see it in my posture. She smiles, feral and satisfied. "If you're surprised, you don't know him that well. I've worked with him a while now, and I'll say this. There's sneakier. There's slicker into a pocket and out again. But there's nobody… _nobody_ … more tenacious. He gets what he wants in the end. Always. You either help him get it or he steps over your corpse to take it." Her smile sours slightly, though she is perhaps unaware of it. "There's no protecting a man like that."

"Where is he now?"

She looks away. "Temple of some sort. I don't really understand it. Don't have to."

"Temple?" says the girl. "To which god?"

The woman shrugs. "Who knows? Maybe it isn't even a god. They were cagey about it. But Brynjulf kept saying this would change our fortunes. We could use it, after Frey." She spits. Creaks and rustles issue from the other thieves as they shift position at the mention of name.

"Frey."

"Used to be one of us. Now he isn't. Before he left, he thought he'd make off with what was ours. Brynjulf and your man are going to get it back." She shrugs. "Now, what's it like above? Are the guards mustering? Do they know he's gone? Was any of them seen leaving?"

"Patrolling. And word is he's still down here."

She looks visibly relieved. "Good. That's good. We didn't think they'd risk it yet, but if they heard… " She stops herself and looks away.

"Why did he come here?" the girl asks, as I am still formulating what else to say.

"Why else?" says the woman. "To make money, I expect."

The girl looks dubious. "He didn't ask about anything else?" she says. "Something he needed... or… wanted to do… ?"

The woman frowns. "He asked some questions… but if was mostly to Brynjulf. Look, he came, he threw money at us, he was good at the job. That's all I know. He wasn't with us long, but… damned if you don't get to trusting him quickly." She grunts as if to put a period on the topic. "Shouldn't you know, anyhow? If you're really his sworn sword, that is."

The girl draws herself up. "I would not lie," she says. "By this good sword, I swear it."

The woman rolls her eyes. I sympathize.

"I was separated from him," says the girl. "He was called away. Something urgent. I'd hoped you could tell me what it was."

"Didn't say anything about urgent," says the woman. She pauses, seems to consider. "But… he was sort of _purposeful_ , I suppose. Couldn't turn around after giving him the job before he was back to say he'd finished it. Like he wanted to hurry it along." She looks troubled.

"I wish he was still here," mutters the girl.

"Yeah, wouldn't that be lovely," the woman sneers, though her voice is more bitter than mocking. "Clear up a lot of problems, that." Her gaze drifts back to me, and her expression hardens. "Now, let's talk about… "

There is a crack like splitting stone as a hidden door bursts wide. All of us look, the woman twitching around on the spot in a motion so rapid her head seems for a moment loosely attached. A man sags against the frame, lit by torchlight from beyond. He wears the same leather garb as many of the others.

"They're coming!" he rasps. His voice is oddly soft for the urgency of his tone. "Maven's men. Down the secret way!" He topples forward, and it is only then that he reveals the arrow in his back.

 _"Move!_ " the woman screams, so shrilly that I wince. She lurches forward a few steps as if to flee, but then rounds on us. "This isn't coincidence. You _are_ hers, you… "

"We're not!" says the girl.

"Then you you were seen!" Spittle is flying from her lips. The thieves are scurrying like ants in a kicked nest, frantically assembling a piecemeal barricade against the door. "They saw you and somehow they…. "

She is becoming obnoxious. I start forward, but before I can strike the girl seizes the thief's collar and starts walking, dragging the smaller woman stumbling behind. They look bizarre, like a child dragging a kind of bobbing human kite. The woman is struggling, but she's so petite that I am not entirely sure the girl has noticed.

"No time for that," the girl says. Her tone is oddly gentle in the midst of all the panic. "Come on."

The thieves are in full flight now, and as we hastily cross before the hidden door, I hear the first thud of impact on the far side. It is feeble, but that means nothing. It is only the first testing. They will be through it soon. The haphazard pile of benches and barrels is too rickety to hold them long. The girl and the woman follow a group along one side of the chamber. I follow behind. Behind me is a slim youth with a very pale face, and behind him only the increasing thuds.

By the time we have reached the door, the archers have only just gotten the wounded man onto his feet. At the sight of him, the woman shakes free of the girl and hurries to assist. The girl hesitates, so I shove her through the door ahead of me. Boots of fleeing thieves are vanishing into the gloom ahead, and we follow at a run. We have just entered the darkness when the first clash of arms echoes out of the shadows ahead.

"What's that?" The girl has drawn her sword and is breathing deeper with each inhalation, as if she is trying to expand her lungs.

"Black-briar's divided her forces."

"No," says the youth from behind us. His voice is rich with the overwrought crispness of panic on a tight leash. "She doesn't have the numbers to divide. Not if she wants to be sure."

I hiss. "Is there any other way out?"

"No. Only… only the two."

"I don't understand," grunts the girl. "What's going on? If that's not Black-briar, then… "

"Jarl Laila. She's allied with Maven," says the boy. "There's no way out."

I unsling my sword. "There's one."


End file.
